


To Hell and Home Again

by agdhani



Series: Daredevil Crossover [2]
Category: 24 (TV), Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Arrow (TV 2012), Daredevil (TV), Jessica Jones (TV)
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-07
Updated: 2016-08-12
Packaged: 2018-06-07 00:19:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 83,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6776413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agdhani/pseuds/agdhani
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>With The Hand and Havensport behind him, Matt Murdock returns to Hell's Kitchen...but nothing is quite the way it should be.  While looking for answers in what should be familiar places and faces, some of those answers, and new troubles, find him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a continuation of my previous Daredevil fic "No One Looks Twice at a Blind Man"...a new set of characters as Matt seeks answers to his unanswered questions.  
> Several OCs, some who are residents of the fictional town of Havensport mentioned in "No One Looks Twice at a Blind Man".  
> A reminder; this is a world in which clones of fictional characters live alongside humans. Some are kept as slaves, servants, or pets, others have more autonomy or are 'free'. Some know they are clones...others do not. This allows for a wide variety of crossover characters from any source available and explains the existence of characters living in each others' universes.  
> There will undoubtedly be violence...but if any need for any other ratings or warnings arise, I will tag the chapters accordingly.

These weren’t his streets.

The eight hour bus ride, longer than he had expected it to be, became a twenty minute taxi ride which ended on the curb of the address he had given the driver, but now that he stood on the curb, suitcase and briefcase in hand, trunk at his feet, he knew this wasn’t right. Certain he had given the driver the correct address, he had counted the turns the driver had made, the lengths of the blocks, distances he knew in his bones from a lifetime having lived these streets. The grinding rattle of the cab’s air conditioner and the too loud blaring of the Indian music the driver had been playing had not only discouraged conversation but had muted all but the nearest of outdoor noises but hearing it now, the underlying hum of the city, the pulse of life, none of it sounded the way Matt believed it should sound.

He knew there were blank spots in his memories, but surely the core of Hell’s Kitchen could be misremembered so thoroughly.

Even the smells were different…newer…fresher…cleaner. Too late to ask the driver if the address was correct, as the cab was already threading its way from the curb to the blaring of a horn from the cars around it. From the fullness of foot traffic around him, business shoes and loafers and ladies’ heels clacking up and down concrete stairs accompanied by professional conversations, friendly laughter, the clipped one-sided voices of Bluetooth dialogues told Matt that what should have been the stairs into the building that had been his home, he was facing a hotel. And each time the double glass doors opened, the air, cooler than the already stifling morning air of this early spring day, carried a balm of flowers, of expensive cuisine, perfume and cologne.

“Can I help you with that, sir?”

Shaking off his reverie, Matt faced the voice of the approaching concierge with what he expected was a perplexed expression upon his face. “Um…yes…thank you.”

“Business bring you in?” The trunk scraped the sidewalk as it was lifted and the man waited for Matt to take his arm before ascending the short set of stairs up to the door landing.

“No, I live…” Matt stopped himself and then shook his head. “I use to live here. Didn’t there use to be a brownstone at this address…?”

“Aye, indeed.” The man’s lilting accent identified him as an Irish immigrant, and that detail, at least made Matt feel slightly more at ease. “A long time ago…you grow up here?”

“How long?” By Matt’s recollection, surely no longer than a matter of weeks…but weeks would not have allowed for the demolition and reconstruction of something of this magnitude. At the top of the steps, he turned to face the street, head cocked to listen up and down the avenue, measuring differences in air current, in sound, in smells, tiny imperceptible things that those with eyes rarely noticed. He gauged this hotel now stood in place of four of what had been familiar side by side buildings.

“Thirty years…no…thirty-two I think…since the fire…”

Matt’s mouth opened but his confusion robbed his voice of sound. That made no sense. Maybe he had forgotten the address of home along with whatever else he had forgotten. This address was stuck in his head like a siren, however, so it must have meant something to him at one time.

They reached the check in desk, where a young woman, the source of the overpowering perfume Matt had detected outside, greeted him with a smile, one that he could not see but judged to be there by the quickening of her heart rate and the excited hitch in her breathing.

“Welcome back, Mr. Murdock. Did you have a good trip?”

“I…” So he had been here before. But when? And why? Why could he not remember it? What in the hell was going on.

Doubting the girl would have the answers he wanted, however, he swallowed the questions and said, “I did, yes. You have my key? Any messages?”

“No messages,” she replied, her fingers lingering upon his palm as she placed the keycard in his hand. “Only this.” There was a small package, the texture of a brown envelope, the size and weight of it suggesting to Matt that it contained money. A lot of it. He forced himself not to scowl as he tucked it into the breast pocket of his jacket.

“Thank you…”

She seemed disappointed at his hesitation, as if she expected him to remember her name, and when he did not speak it, she prompted, “Barbara…”

“Barbara…yes…sorry. Been a long night…a long time since I’ve slept…”

The excuse satisfied her, bringing the smile back with it. “Oh, that’s okay, Mr. Murdock. I’ll see that you’re not disturbed then.”

A group of eight men and women in business attire was joined by the crispness of bodies in uniforms behind him and Matt gestured.

“Oh, don’t mind them,” Barbara chirped. “There’s a convention of some sort this weekend…medical types…doctors and the like…but they’re well below your penthouse suite…you won’t even know they’re here, I swear.”

Penthouse. Well that sounded right at least. Unless he hid away in his room, he would rub elbows with the convention guests, but he could not do that. There were people he had to find. Answers he needed that he was not going to find here…unless they were in his room.

A second concierge, a youngster likely of college age or a kid barely out of high school, escorted Matt into the elevator and up to the twelfth floor of the hotel, the top floor judging by the clicks and clunks made by the elevator as it passed each one. He chattered about nothing, about city gossip of the sort residents expected, updates on day to day details that Matt would have once been keenly aware of but which now seemed connected to something distant and intangible. Though references to streets and landmarks remained the same, striking familiar notes, the overall chords of memory were discordant, clipped and blurred as if about details entirely outside of his experience.

And he was beginning to get a headache trying to sort them out.

Taking the key, the concierge opened the door, took the trunk and suitcase off of the rolling cart he had placed them on, and set them inside the door. The dusty scents from inside sparked familiarity, and for a moment, Matt finally believed he might have found home.

“Buy yourself something nice…” He slipped a $100 bill into the young man’s hand. He figured the boy could use it. The young man choked.

“That’s too much, sir…”

“No…it’s not.” Matt had been well paid for keeping Logan out of jail, more than he had expected to be paid actually, and he had cleared out every remaining dollar from the bank card account that had been set up for him upon his arrival in Havensport. With that hotel already paid for, and no intention of being followed, the card was destroyed; his ticket to Hell’s Kitchen was paid for in cash, and when he left Havensport, he left nothing behind.

Nothing material, at any rate.

It occurred to him that whoever had sent him on that trip, they were likely the ones who had left this new envelope full of bills as well. Maybe they were paying him for the work he had done against The Hand. Maybe they knew he had destroyed the bank card and this was the only way they could pay him.

Maybe there was more than one party working in his life.

“Thank you…thank you sir…and, sir…?” Matt’s hand on the door hesitated before closing it between them. “Good to see the reports of your death weren’t true.”

Reports of his death? This time he did not bother to hide the scowl. The boy knew him then, or knew of him, or was familiar with his coming and going in this place. So why hadn’t the doorman recognized him. What in God’s name was going on? “No…they’re not true, I assure you.”

The kid smiled, shoved the bill into the pants pocket of his uniform, and whistled his way back to the elevator.

Only when the elevator door was closed did Matt breathe easier, and only when he calmed his center could he play closer attention to the suite he had entered.

Given the décor of the lobby, the glass and light, carpet and decorative foliage, the bright modernity of the corridor beyond the door, this room was stark, barren…drab…and smelled like darkness and old paint and the mustiness of disuse.

It smelled exactly the way it should. It smelled like home.

Everything in it, every piece of furniture, the hum of fluorescent lighting from the large advertisement beyond his windows…lit even in the day…the sound of the floorboards beneath his feet, the wear of the upholstery, the feel of the blanket draped over the back of it, the layout of condiments and utensils and the dishrack beside the sink, the clang of beer bottles in the otherwise empty refrigerator…

It was exactly the way he expected it to be. It took some of the edge of his discomfiture, but it did not explain the dichotomy of the outside of the building or the floors below this one. Two things existing in tandem that should not…

But at least he was home amongst familiar safety. A shower, he decided, shoving the trunk into the place it belonged, a shower and a nap would make him feel normal…and then he would venture back into the unfamiliar and find the faces he needed to ground him and make him truly feel at home. They were the ones that could make sense of a world that he was beginning to doubt was even real.


	2. 2

It wasn’t Josie’s, but it was a bar, tucked into the same location where Matt expected it to be. Or rather, it was where he had hoped it would be, since the day had robbed him of the ability to expect anything to be the way his memory told him it should be. Where there had once been…or should have been…a small sign announcing the law firm he still considered him a part of, there had been a blank wall. The addresses that should have belonged to Franklin Nelson and Karen Page both housed different people, and an effort to get to Metro General, hoping that Claire, at least might still be there, revealed there was no hospital of that name.

There had been.

Certain he was losing his mind, he stopped at the local precinct office, where no officer by the name of Brett Mahoney worked. And while the church still stood, no priest by the name of Lantom served there. It was as if Matt’s entire existence had been erased, replaced by this altered reality, or someone was playing a very elaborate hoax on him. But such a wide-spread conspiracy seemed unlikely, so why did his memories not match the reality his senses were showing him?

At least the bar…while not Josie’s…was in a familiar location, and even smelled close to the way it should. His shoes stuck to the floor, to the residue of spilled beer, in a familiar way, and the chatter of local patrons, regulars comfortable with each other after so many late nights drinking in each other’s presence, was much the same as it had ever been.

But there was no mistaking the hush that came over the patrons when he pushed inside, the heads turning his way and then ducking together to share hushed whispers. He took a few hesitant steps towards the bar without making an effort to single out any one conversation, to learn the root of the change in the mood about him.

His elbows had barely settled upon the edge of the bar when a crash, the dropping of a bottle or glass some six feet away from him and the accompanying squeak and gasp for breath snapped his attention there. It wasn’t the sound, it wasn’t a smell. It was the barely discernable intake of breath, a familiar sound that raked over his skin and made the tiny hairs upon his arms and the back of his neck stand on end.

“Karen…?”

It was not Karen who spoke however, but rather an exasperated voice of familiar distress and disbelief accompanied by the equally familiar grip of hands upon his arms, that answered his query.

“Matt…what the hell…is it really you…?”

“Foggy…” The word rushed out of him, carrying all of his earlier confusion and desperation out of his body in one harsh breath of relief. He felt no shame in crushing the other man against his chest and holding him there, absorbing every detail of his friend that had never changed.

Whatever Foggy was feeling however, caused him to pull back too abruptly to stare at Matt with what he knew to be an exasperated expression without seeing it. Foggy pulled the glasses from Matt’s face, perhaps hoping to see something in his eyes, and Matt held his breath, fearing for a moment that this was yet another trick of his memory.

But he was just as quickly released when the woman…it had to be Karen…rushed past towards the door, the sound of her breathing indicating crying. Foggy shoved his glasses into his hand and cried, “Karen!” before leaving Matt alone at the bar to rush after her. In a matter of moments Matt was alone at the bar, wondering what the hell had just happened.

He could have used that beer then, or several, but he abandoned that need to follow his friends outside. By the time he fought his way out the door, however, the pair was gone, nearly a block away, Foggy trying to comfort the inconsolable woman whose words were racked for breath and mostly broken into incomprehensible fragments. Matt briefly debated following them, demanding answers rather than risking them getting too far away and disappearing into the ether of a tangled, disjointed memory, but that seemed cruel, maybe even unnecessary.

And so with the hopes that they would find him, and the belief that they must know where he had been staying before if they had known him prior to his memory lapse, Matt settled on hitting things. There were always crimes afoot in Hell’s Kitchen, even if this Hell’s Kitchen was misaligned with his memories, and the chance of taking out his frustrations on those deserving of punishment helped him feel a little more in control of his life.

How many hours he spent at work, how many men he knocked out and brought to the attention of the authorities, he did not know. He did not count either marker of time. It felt good…but it did not feel entirely right…for reasons he could not put his finger on and was too exhausted, by the time he dragged himself through the roof access door to his loft. Dawn was not far off and he hoped, as he closed the door behind him, that a second sleep in a familiar bed would reset the balance in his world and help it all make sense again.

“You were dead!”

It was only marginally surprising to find Foggy in his living room. He assumed he had given his best friend a key at some time, though he could not remember doing so.

“Obviously, I’m not, Foggy.” He was too weary for an argument, but this was, perhaps, his best opportunity to find answers, and so he did not try to send Foggy away. Besides, after the day he’d had, he honestly did not want his friend’s comforting familiar presence to go.

“We saw it, Matt! Karen and Claire and I….we saw that sword run you through! We saw the gun to your head…heard the gunshot…we buried you, for chrissake…!”

Matt involuntarily fingered the center of his chest, a reflexive action reacting to the residue of a trauma he did not recall. Perhaps his body did remember, however, even if his mind did not. Maybe that explained the headaches and the too frequent twisting pain in his chest. “But I’m here…”

“I can see that! What the hell happened to you? Where have you been? Why haven’t you called…?”

“Because I was dead?” Matt tried to sound light hearted as he pulled his helmet from his face and tossed it onto the sofa. Foggy obviously knew about the duality of his life and was not shocked by it…or was at least pretending to accept it for the sake of whatever relationship remained between them.

“Matt…”

“I don’t know, Foggy…I don’t know anything!” The refrigerator gave up one of its three beers and Matt popped the top of with his thumb. “I don’t remember…”

He was going to need to shop tomorrow.

“What do you remember?”

The fridge thudded closed behind him. “Standing on a train station platform in a city called Havensport…where I’ve been for the last…month?” He had not been keeping track of the passing days to be certain how long he had been there. “The bus trip here…wherever here is…”

“Home, Matt. You’re home…”

“Am I? Then why doesn’t it feel like it? Why is nothing the same…nothing…right?”

“Of course it’s the same…”

“Nelson and Murdock, Foggy…Metro General…hell…the brownstone…”

He heard it then, the skipping of Foggy’s heart, the rise in his blood pressure accompanied by the smell of discomfort and perhaps a touch of fear. “Maybe,” the other man stammered, “the injury…whatever it was that kept you alive…robbed you of your memories. Maybe that coffin was empty…and they revived you…”

“They, who, Foggy? Who’s ‘they’?”

“I…I don’t know…someone. Someone obviously saved you…brought you back…”

Considering the reactions of the boy who had helped him with his luggage, and Barbara at the desk, others here had known him. Others, aside from Foggy and Karen, had believed him dead. Yet he was not…so someone obviously HAD saved his life. If the huge hole in his memory, the sketchiness of what he did remember, was the result of physical trauma, a near death experience and what had undoubtedly been a long period of recovery, then maybe everything around him was ‘right’ after all…and it was his memory that was faulty. But Foggy was not telling him everything he knew, was clearly hiding something from him.

He did not have the willpower to force answers out of his friend tonight.

“Maybe,” he relented. “How long?”

“How long have you been gone? How long have we mourned you? A year, Matt. One whole lousy year…or it would have been a year in two weeks’ time. Why the hell didn’t you call?”

“I tried…but the numbers I…they were out of service.” He knew Foggy was scowling.

“They’re the same.” Tone still exasperated and as confused as Matt’s was, he asked, “You don’t remember anything from before you were…?”

“Killed?” This was going to be a long conversation, Matt began to strip out of the red suit, deciding he might as well be comfortable if this was going to go on longer. “Josie’s…Nelson and Murdock…”

“Those don’t…” Foggy snapped his mouth shut and raked his hand through his hair.

“They’re gone…I know…if they were ever really there…”

“Nelson and Murdock was real…at least for a while…at least until you…”

That made sense. Matt dropped down into a chair, his black silk boxers sticking to sweaty skin that could finally breathe now that it was exposed to the relatively cool air of the loft. “I don’t blame you for moving on…” Any firm they’d shared together would obviously have ended when Matt was presumed dead. Quitting the firm, leaving that office behind, would have been a logical extension of moving on with his live, and Matt could not blame Foggy for that. At least it explained why one of his memories was out of sync.

“And Karen…? Claire? Brett?”

“Brett was transferred ages ago…” Matt could hear the dishonesty in those words, but again chose not to push. He’d long ago come to accept that people lied, some innocently to avoid hurting feelings or out of embarrassment, some maliciously. Whatever Foggy was hiding, he believed it was the best thing format.

Maybe it was.

“And Karen? Claire?”

“They’re good…or they were until…” Foggy finally sank down into the other empty chair, leaving the red suit to occupy the sofa alone. “It took her a long time to get over you, you know. I moved her in with Claire and me…”

“You…and Claire?” Matt blinked.

“No…not like that.” Foggy’s laughter was embarrassed and sincere. “She needed somewhere to stay, after a fire in her building…and I had that spare room, remember? It saves us both on rent and utilities…and after you…we thought it best not to leave her alone.”

Though Matt’s gaze fell as if he were staring at his clasped hands, his eyes were closed while he dug through his memory for scraps that would support what Foggy told him. Foggy had always had a spare bedroom…Matt did remember often ribbing him about that. But Foggy had gotten a really good deal on that place and had always used the excuse that he was saving that room for Matt…that someday Matt would see the wisdom of the two of them sharing an apartment as well as a business.

Of course, that had been before the revelation that Matt was Daredevil, when everything had changed between them, driving home the fact that he and Matt were never going to share any more of their lives then they already did. How could they, when Matt’s nocturnal activities would have become public knowledge for any woman Foggy brought home…not that there were many…and that sharing living space with Daredevil was going to open up his friend’s life to more risk and danger than Matt was willing to cause.

Matt had a feeling, however, that maybe he and Karen had been closer to each other than he remembered; it would account for her severe upset at his death, and her reaction upon seeing him again. She’d had a year to get over him, to move on, to find someone else…but maybe that was asking too much.

“I never meant to…I never wanted to hurt…”

“I know that.” Foggy’s heavy sigh lingered in the air between them. Whatever he knew, whatever he was not sharing, he had come to terms with Matt’s absence, his explanation of it, at least enough to no longer be as angry as he had been when he’d come here. “I’ll explain it to her…to both of them…but you’ll have to give her time, Matt. And you won’t be able to pick up where you left off. It won’t be fair to her…to either of them…so lay off…”

“To either…? Who?”

“Karen and Claire...”

Staring in the direction of Foggy’s voice, Matt mentally made the leap Foggy’s words implied, but he quickly pushed that conclusion aside. It wasn’t possible. It wasn’t the way he remembered either woman; he was clearly hearing Foggy wrong.

“You know I won’t.” Losing someone, and then finding them again, could not be an easy thing. Even Matt felt anxious about seeing the two women again, although now his nervousness was compounded by the reality of his ‘death’ and ‘resurrection’ and the knowledge of just how upset the others must have been to witness that.

“Good…because we can’t do that again. You’ve not put that away…” Foggy eyed the suit, curious about how Matt had gotten his hands on it after Foggy had done his best to bury it where no one would ever find it. Maybe Matt had a spare. Maybe whoever made the first one had made him a duplicate.

“Foggy…you know I can’t…”

“After what you put us through…maybe it’s time to reconsider…or at least…” He hesitated before asking, “You back for good now then?”

“Yes.” The answer was quick, given without thought and without consideration to the disquiet that had festered within his soul since stepping off the bus early that morning…or rather yesterday morning now, as he realized again that daylight was not far in the offing. He had been born in Hell’s Kitchen, had grown up in the bosom of a city that had made him everything he was today. To his knowledge, travelling to Havensport had not been by choice for he had no reason to want to leave this city. It was home. It was where he had always belonged. He could think of no reason why that much of his reality should not still hold true.

“I hope so.” Glancing out the window, Foggy grunted and got to his feet. “Work in a few hours…but I promised Karen I would come…I would see if it was really you…I’m glad to see it is.”

Then why, Matt thought, did Foggy not sound glad? Why did he sound hesitant…reluctant even?

Maybe not wanting to see Karen hurt again was reason enough. Matt knew how Foggy felt about her. He couldn’t blame his friend for wanting to protect Karen’s feelings. Matt wanted to do the same thing.

He followed Foggy to the door, aware of the sounds of birds chattering the early morning greeting to the sun on the electrical wires outside. “Dinner tonight? In the restaurant downstairs? My treat?”

“Life must be looking up for you,” Matt countered with a chuckle.

“Moving on, moving up…but there are days when I miss Nelson and Murdock.”

Matt bobbed his head, the melancholy and a trace of unexpected guilt beginning to seep in around the corners of his conscience…even though he could think of no reason why he should feel guilty for a ‘death’ he could not remember. “Me too, Foggy. I’ll be there.” He had expected to come back to Hell’s Kitchen, to Nelson and Murdock, and finding that it was no longer there for him to return to filled him with a peculiar sense of emptiness.

What was he supposed to do with his days now?

“Seven o’clock. Don’t be late.”

“I won’t be.” It would be too early to let the devil loose, but would give him plenty of time to sleep and prepare himself for what promised to be an awkward evening.

Foggy hesitated in the doorway, awkwardly trying to decide what to say or do next. They appeared to stare at one another for several moments, before Foggy gave him a hasty hug that gave way to his stepping into the brightly lit hotel corridor.

If the contradiction of the hotel versus Matt’s loft seemed unusual to Foggy, it did not show.

“It’s good to see you, Matt…I’m glad you’re back…just…be careful, okay?”

“Aren’t I always?”

“Do you really want an answer to that?”

Matt swallowed down his first thoughts and shrugged. “No…I suppose not.”


	3. 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The introduction of a few new players to the field...with references to RP events that I tried to keep as vague and unconfusing for the readers to follow.

Cassandra Bruce, medical corpsman and member of the elite Special Forces team Gamma Six, adjusted her name badge one more time before entering the dining hall where the pre-conference dinner for all attendees was being held. She had almost missed her flight to be here, thanks to her father’s parting list of instructions and requests, but she’d made it with only minutes to spare.

Her grandfather, General Thorne, had pulled strings to get her into this conference when it had been rumored to be full, and while Cassie understood her father’s reluctance to let her go in his place, she had insisted on it. The birth of her new siblings two weeks prior meant that her father needed to be home with his wife, her mother; he might be the Team Leader, the team’s chief medical officer, but his family needed him.

And Cassie had been planning this trip for months. She imagined Jim would be happy to have her out of his hair for a week. Whatever matter was the sticking point between them, the separation would either do them some good or would else be the final wedge to drive them apart.

But she wanted to be here, to hear the speakers and discover the latest in military medical technology and research. With the rapidly changing face of the military expanding to include clone soldiers with a variety of abilities and needs, the medical field scrambled continuously to remain up to date, to provide the very best care for the soldiers in the field as well as those who had come home from service and the families they left behind.

Maybe she would learn something that might help her father. He had not been the same since he had come back, and something had to be done, else he would never lead Gamma Six again. The team would survive, she would continue on it for as long as she was capable of serving her country…but he was her father. Gamma would not be the same without him.

The dining tables were filling up in the conference hall already, clusters of doctors, scientists, soldiers and pharmaceutical representatives gathered to themselves, many seated with their spouses, leaving spots scattered here and there for those who had come alone to fill in. Cassie saw no one she knew, but the secrecy with which Gamma operated meant that there was little mingling with ‘normal’ soldiers, and unless any one of those here had passed through Havensport’s Naval yard, training facility, or hospital, it was likely she’d recognize no one. But Cassie did not fear strangers, felt no anxiety about sitting amongst people she had never met, and when a handsome young man in his mid-thirties smiled at her and waved her over, she took the invitation for what it was and joined his still largely empty table.

A little harmless flirting never hurt anyone, and she liked his smile.

“Good to see I’m not the only pretty face here on my own.” He offered his hand as she set her handbag upon the table and pulled out the chair beside him.

Accepting his compliment with her own smile, not exactly encouraging the attention but not discouraging it either, she shook his hand, approving of his firm grip, and said, “British? I didn’t realize this was an international conference.”

“We’re here from all over. See…that group there,” he pointed to six men and women at a nearby table, “Germans. And there…Saudi if I’m not mistaken. That handsome gent there is from Brazil…those lovely ladies are both from France…and though I don’t see them yet, I’m pretty sure there’s a Japanese delegation as well. Anyone with their fingers in the medical research and applications pie will be here for the big unveiling.”

“Unveiling of what?” Cassie had the four day itinerary tucked into her bag, but after signing up for a number of talks and workshops and demonstrations, she had not studied it again. She did not recall anything about an unveiling, however, unless he was referring to one of the twice daily product demonstrations that would be conducted throughout the conference.

“That’s just it…no one knows. All of us guests are entered into the lottery to attend, but we won’t know until tomorrow afternoon who the lucky handful will be.”

“Oh…yes…” She recalled the mention in the brochure of the chance for each guest to attend a special product demonstration, but she had largely ignored that passage, believing the ‘luck of the draw’ would fall more to those of highest rank and company position, those who stood to make the product developers the most money. Her father might have garnered the favor of inclusion, but Cassie did not expect to.

“Lance Hunter.”

“Cassie Bruce.”

He glanced at the rank insignia on her name tag. Navy SEAL med-corps. Well, she did not look like any SEAL he had ever met or worked with, but if she’d managed to pull such a distinguish, she wasn’t going to be one to mess with. Not that her rank troubled him. He liked strong women, especially deceptively beautiful ones. They were always more of a challenge; he liked challenges.

“Med corps?”

“My father wanted me to be a doctor…I wanted to be a soldier, like him…so we compromised. You?”

Hunter held his hands up as if in surrender. “Boss has me standing in for our own doctor; he couldn’t make it, the tickets were paid…so here I am. I suspect most of this is going to go over my head, but I take good notes…and there’ll be enough handouts…that I should be able to fill our guys in.”

“You’re probably not the only one in that boat. I think the sessions are being recorded as well…and available for all the attendees afterwards…for a fee of course…”

“Of course,” Hunter laughed. “Fortunately I have unlimited use of the company credit card…so if you’d care to go for drinks after dinner…”

Cassie grinned. He was a forward, cheeky chap, unashamed to hit on her, unafraid of rejection. She wasn’t looking for a fling, but new friendships, good company, a bit of fun without the heavy weight of family pressing her down. “No promises…but maybe.”

“Good enough.” He smiled again, lifted his wine glass as one of the wait staff came to fill it, and turned his head to face the podium where an older, bearded gentleman with an air of distinction was tapping on the mike. “Looks like this party is about to start.”

Though the tables weren’t yet filled, and there were still guests milling about, Hunter appeared to be right. The tapping of the mike brought people to fill in the last of the empty seats, and though Cassie nodded at the newcomers, her attention too turned towards the speaker.

*

Jack hadn’t anticipated taking refuge in a hotel full of military personnel and medical experts; when he had had made the reservation in the only New York City hotel he had experience with, no one had mentioned a conference and he had not asked. He knew he was fortunate enough to get the last empty room, but it seemed the place was always busy, sitting in such a central city location as it did, not so many blocks away from Time Square and the more touristy centers of the city. He was only blocks away from Chloe and her husband too, the main reason he had come to New York after the debacle that had become his personal life in Havensport.

He was not a piece of meat to be haggled over, tossed about from house to house, treated with the disrespect that kept others from telling him the truth. He’d had to learn of the feud between the Bruces and Stephens, and while he wanted to be no part of it, he was, instead, at the core of it, left with choices that would only hurt someone no matter which path he followed.

Better that he take some time away, let the air clear and the dust settle before he went back. And though he and Chloe O’Brian could not be considered drinking buddies, he did consider her a friend, one who had offered him her sofa any time he happened to be in New York and in need of a place to crash.

Of course that offer had been made before she had reconnected with Morris, before the two had merged their households and remarried. Jack did not know Morris well enough to impose upon him with the sofa-sleeping request, and he did not want to feel like the odd third wheel in the newly-weds’ home. Since he had arrived without warning on a night when the couple had plans, Jack resorted to his favorite hotel. Tomorrow he would do the tourist thing, visit places he had sworn he would see some day and yet never had…having always been in the city on business…and when Chloe was free, they’d get together and catch up on their lives.

He could guarantee that Chloe would bluntly tell him the truth about everything, whether he wanted to see that truth or not. It was why he needed to see her. He wanted blunt honest for a change.

He sat in the main dining hall at the bar, nursing his drink and staring at the throng of people in the conference room across the way. He estimated there to be close to three hundred guests there, potentially more, more than the hotel could reasonably accommodate at any rate so many had to be staying elsewhere. It explained the congested guest roster and why Jack had noted so many men and women with military insignia when he had checked in over an hour ago. The signs he had seen posted about suggested a medical conference, and thinking about it now made him scowl.

Hopefully that did not mean that Carl Bruce would be here. He was likely to punch the man in the teeth if they bumped into each other. He’d always respected Carl, admired his work ethic and his skills, even while resenting the way the man treated his wife; but discovering that the respect was not mutual had soured Jack’s opinion of him. Carl Bruce was the root of why Jack was here now…and if he had the misfortune or running into the man, such a meeting was not going to end well.

It was just as well that, from where Jack sat, he did not see anyone he knew. He was not planning on loitering around the hotel long enough to interact with the other guests. He’d finish his drink, finish the dinner he had ordered, and head up to his room. He wouldn’t be able to hear them from there. He hoped.

*

“I thought you said dinner…”

There were so many people crammed into the conference room that had been converted into a dining hall that Matt felt as if he would suffocate from their closeness. He did not normally mind crowds…one could not live in Hell’s Kitchen and avoid them forever…but he had expected a quiet meal with three friends instead of what had proven to be a business dinner of sorts.

“This is dinner,” Foggy chuckled.

“Package deal with the conference tickets,” explained Claire, as surprised to see Matt as Foggy and Karen had been but easily calmer and more pragmatic. Matt had come home, with enough memories to be ‘their’ Matt, and that was all that mattered. Whatever he was to each of them, however much worry and aggravation his double life might cause them, it was still a welcome relief to see him alive again.

“You’re still a nurse then?” Karen had yet to look Matt in the eye or to speak to him, but Claire, as usual, was not shy.

“At a clinic nearby, yes. The pay’s not the best, and clientele can be a bit much…but there’s less politics involved in the day to day business of treating patients.” Matt should have known that, but Foggy had already explained the gaps in his memory to the women, so Claire was not surprised that he did not remember where she worked.

It explained why Claire would attend such a conference. A local medical educational opportunity was always a good way to advance one’s career and score an increase in pay. It did not, however, explain why Karen was attending, something that was hinted at when the three had met Matt in the lobby.

“Karen’s writing a piece for the Herald,” Foggy said proudly.

Ah…that made sense. “Following Ben’s footsteps,” Matt said with a knowing nod; she’d had great respect for the murdered investigative reporter, and she was a superb investigator. Her assistance had been invaluable to he and Foggy, and with Nelson and Murdock forced out of business by Matt’s presumed death, it was good that she’d followed her passion. More than anything, Matt wanted her to be happy.

She did not seem to be that way now.

“I’m just lucky enough to get an exclusive with Dr. Gael Alvarez…he’s one of the two doctors hosting this conference…” Karen murmured as if embarrassed.

“He’s quite reclusive,” explained Foggy.

“Dr. Alvarez is one of the leading researchers in genetic modification and sequencing,” Claire hastily added. Matt sensed an exchange of glances between her and Foggy over Karen’s head. “I’ve had several course with him over the years; he’s been my mentor, my advisor, my friend when I was in nursing school. He got us the spots in the conference and agreed to do this interview for Karen.”

Matt heard the unspoken notes beneath the words, the hint that this was more than a simple interview, that all three were anxious about anyone overhearing their intentions. He did not know what was meant by genetic modification and sequencing, what that sort of research entailed or might be used for, but the way Claire said it, it sounded important, controversial even…and perhaps dangerous. That hint of danger automatically put Matt’s nerves on alert, particularly when the gentleman at the podium tapped the mike and cleared his throat before saying, “On behalf of our sponsors, I would like to welcome each of you to the fifth international Global Health Symposium, organized by our generous hosts at Roxxon.”

Claire leaned closer to Matt’s ear and whispered, “That’s him.”

Alvarez was a distinguished man, past his prime but still fit and handsome enough, with the silver streaking his full head of dark hair and bright dark eyes, to command the attention of both the ladies, and the men, alike. He spoke with charismatic authority in a strong voice that belied his age and suggested a keenness of intellect that still sought for, and found, answers in the scientific and medical world around him. His accent suggested his Hispanic heritage, though not Cuban, Matt knew, and was gentle and smooth enough, despite its strength, to likely have wooed and broken a number of hearts throughout the man’s life. He sounded like a sincere man, and Matt quickly understood why Claire had been, and continued to be, so fond of him.

“For those of you who have not had the dubious pleasure of being one of my students, I am Doctor Gael Alvarez of New York University. . As those of you who have attended this symposium in previous years, our panel of presenters has been gathered from amongst the brightest, most innovative and advanced medical laboratories, technological research centers, and experienced field operatives from around the world. Our goal, as always, is to share our work with the men and women serving our soldiers and their families, and eventually the world, in the spirit of spreading peace and understanding. Over the next four days, we encourage you to test all of the presented products for yourselves, ask questions, and take advantage of every opportunity to explore how we can work with you, and for you, to save the lives of our servicemen and their families and the communities in which we all work. For tonight…enjoy your meal, and join us afterwards for cocktails and conversation in the Blue South Conference room….and again…welcome.”

Obligatory applause accompanied his descent from the platform as the ordered meals began to arrive. The food even smelled expensive, and as he had not eaten all day, Matt was eager to partake, as well as eager to engage in the small talk with friends that would allow him to catch up on the apparently missing year of his life. All of the dialogue floated upon that uneasy feeling that Matt could not shake, a feeling he attributed as much to the earlier suggestion of controversy and danger as he did to Karen’s avoidance of his face. She did seem to relax over the course of the meal and yet he knew that she, like the others, was hiding something from him.

Eventually the meal ran its course and though he considered inviting them out for drinks, the hour was already growing late and the conference started early the following morning. Their empty glasses that attested to more than a little drinking were clustered in the center of the table, the dinner and dessert plates already cleared away, and many of the guests had already vacated the dining room in favor of the Blue South open bar. Foggy pushed back from the table and excused himself to the nearest restroom, and Claire, after a kiss to Karen’s cheek, scurried off for a short word with Alvarez, intending to make introductions but, Matt suspected, using it largely as an excuse to leave he and Karen alone.

A kiss? Matt frowned, not because he disapproved of such things, but because it tentatively answered some of the evening’s awkwardness question in a way that he had never seen coming.

Of course, to his recollection, Karen and Claire had never met during what the portion of his life he did remember. Had they met during the hole in his memories, or had that come after his death?

“Your funeral,” Karen murmured, still averting her eyes. Matt could not see it, but he could tell by the directionality of her voice that she was not facing him as she spoke.

“What?”

“That’s when we met…when we buried you.”

Wondering how she knew what he had been thinking, he asked, “Is it…?” But without knowing exactly what he wanted to ask, and whether or not he really wanted answers, the question faltered and was left unfinished.

Assuming what the question would have been, Karen sighed as if expecting it; the rustle of the fabric of her blouse indicated the shrugging of her shoulders. “I don’t know…I think so…I mean…it wasn’t something I planned. After you…after I saw you…the world went to shit, Matt. I couldn’t eat…I couldn’t sleep…I just kept seeing you there…all that blood…” She shuddered. “If not for Foggy and Claire…”

The emotion in her voice, the lilt on the final word supported by the hitch in her breathing and the tripping flutter of her heart told Matt more than he really needed to know. Behind his red tinted glasses, he closed his eyes, but the sigh that rose in his chest was swallowed before she could hear it. He could not recall how close they might have been before…although Karen’s professed reaction, which Foggy had hinted at earlier, suggested they had been very close…and he could not decide in this moment what his true feelings were for her. But the flutterings at the edges of his perceptions spoke of his disappointment and that must have meant, he thought with remorse, that some part of him was interested in Karen. If she was happy now with Claire, however, for all of the strangeness of it, then the kindest thing to do was let her be happy, to not interfere. The right thing to do, the Catholic thing, was to wish them the best and keep any suffering over it to himself.

He was very good at suffering. That was one thing Matt knew too well.

“I’m sorry…about whatever happened…” It wasn’t easy to apologize for dying when he did not remember doing it, did not remember the circumstances and events that had led up to it, but he felt that he must apologize nonetheless…for hurting her if nothing else.

He didn’t even know who had killed him, or why, or if they had been apprehended…but it did not seem appropriate to ask right now.

“I know you are.” Whoever’s fault it had been, be it the guilty for the crime or Matt’s for his role as the vigilante that had resulted in his premature ‘death’, there was no longer any point in laying the blame.

“And I’m sorry I didn’t call…”

Again with the shrug. “Foggy told me…and it’s okay. But…” Now she did look at him; he could feel the focus of her attention on him in a way that again made the hair on his neck stand on edge. “I guess I…you’re not mad at me?”

“At you?”

“For…not waiting…for…Claire…”

“How could I be mad…you thought I was dead…for all I know, I WAS dead…”

“Karen, Matt…Dr. Gael Alvarez. This is Karen Page…Matt Murdock.”

“A pleasure…” The doctor placed a lingering kiss on Karen’s knuckles with a smile, then took Matt’s hand to shake it without fanfare. “Claire has told me so much about both of you.”

Matt did not know the voice; it sounded no different than it had when the man had spoken from the podium. But something in the touch of his hand, in his own particular scent that combined personal body musk with a cologne which carried a hint of eucalyptus, a hint of spearmint, and at least a dozen other trace elements that Matt did not take the time to analyze, was jarringly familiar, enough so that if he was able to see, he knew he would be staring at Alvarez with shock and confusion. But they had never met before, there was no reason for them to have done so…so why did the touch of the doctor’s hand send a cold static surge throughout Matt’s body?

He almost asked if they knew one another, but the question was too absurd to voice. He wrote the sensation off as meaning nothing at all.

“I’m afraid I’ve not yet had that pleasure,” Matt replied.

“My college days never came up in conversation with Matt.” Claire was hanging on to Alvarez’ arm affectionately, which he seemed to enjoy a great deal.

“She’s told me everything…”

Smiling at Karen, Alvarez said, “I hope not everything…”

“Enough that I can’t wait to sit down for that interview.”

Though Karen’s words were bright and enthusiastic, they carried enough of a hint of that early controversial expectation that it drew a shroud of seriousness over them just as Foggy rejoined them. He wrapped one arm around Karen’s shoulders with brotherly affection.

“Foggy Nelson…Franklin,” he corrected himself as he snatched up the man’s empty free hand.

“Yes, of course…you could be no one else.” Spoken with the same warmth with which he had greeted Matt and Karen, even Matt wasn’t sure if the comment was friendly or possibly perturbed with Foggy’s forwardness. Whichever it was, Foggy neither seemed to mind nor notice; he had clearly had a little too much to drink over dinner. “Tomorrow evening, five thirty. Shall we meet in the lobby near the fountain?”

“I’ll be there,” Karen promised. The day’s last scheduled seminar ended at five, and what came after would be more cocktails and likely a host of private meetings as business deals, job offers, and more political accords were struck.

“And you two will call me when you’re done, right?” slurred Foggy.

Claire chuckled. “We’ll get home in one piece…”

“I know you will…but I want to know when you’re coming…I might be having a wild orgy there after all…” He grinned widely and tried to wink at playfully at Matt, but the expression did not quite work as he intended it to and Claire rolled her eyes.

“Okay, Don Juan…let’s get you home. Gael…we’ll see you tomorrow?”

“I look forward to it.” He was not, it seemed, put off with Foggy’s inebriated behavior, only smiled knowingly as if he too had been in such a compromising position more than once in his life. He took his leave of them while Matt braced up Foggy on the other side of his slowly slouching body.

“I’ll help you to a cab,” he offered. Unlike the others, he was home, had only to take the elevator to the top floor. When he did, he knew what his evening would entail, but first he wanted to be sure that Foggy got home, or at least into a cab, safely.

Claire hailed one right outside the door, and between the three of them they got Foggy as comfortably into the cab as he could be.

“Thank you,” Karen said.

“He’s going to regret this in the morning…depending on how much of it he remembers.”

Sharing a wickedly playful glance with Karen, Claire said, “Oh, he will regret it alright…along with any other embellishments we decide to add.”

Matt couldn’t help but chuckle. It felt good to laugh again. The dynamics with his friends might have changed, but they were still his friends. It felt so good to have connected with his own reality after the strangeness that had been Havensport.

Oddly, he realized through his laughter, he missed that city…and his new friends there…too.

“He’ll love you both for it, I’m sure.”

Claire grasped Matt’s shoulders and looked into his face. She did not need to ask what his plans for the evening were now, what he would do as soon as the cab pulled away from the curb. His night would be no different than any other he spent in Hell’s Kitchen.

“You take care of yourself, you hear me?” she scolded. “We just got you back…we wouldn’t want to lose you again.”

“You won’t,” he promised. It might be a promise he could not keep, but it was always one he strived for.

Karen pushed between them to hug him tightly, more of a gesture not to let him go than to say goodnight. “We’ll stop up to see you during our break tomorrow, okay? You’d better be home.”

“I will be.” Of course he would be. He didn’t have anywhere else to go.


	4. 4

It was undoubtedly morbid, but how many people could legitimately claim to have visited their own grave? Matt needed to know, needed to see the evidence for himself that proved the reality reported by those he knew…or had known. He needed to assess whether this was some elaborate hoax meant to confuse or manipulate his perception of reality. He found it logically impossible to believe someone would have gone to the trouble of burying him if he clearly had not died.

But here, in the stillness of the cemetery, backlit by the glow of the surrounding city lights, was the headstone with his name upon the relatively unsullied surface, cleaner and newer than those older markers nearest to it but bearing enough evidence of the year that he was told had passed to prove that it had, indeed, been here that long.. Of course, a headstone meant little, only that someone had paid for the external trappings of death, and if what Foggy suggested was true, there was a casket buried here as further ‘proof’ to those who had seen it lowered into the earth. But other than the witnessed stabbing and shooting, that could have been proof enough of his death, how did anyone know that it was Matthew Murdock interred in that casket? Maybe he had survived those injuries? Perhaps the attack had been a ruse meant to make others believe he was dead? Maybe someone else’s body had been laid to rest here, or the casket could be empty. It had been, according to Foggy, a closed casket funeral service after all. Had anyone seen his dead body with their own eyes after the moment of ‘death’?

Without exhumation, it was impossible to prove who was buried here…if anyone at all.

At a glance, at least, it appeared that the report was true, that he had died, despite the evidence of his breath that proved, as surely as his fingers traced the etching of his name upon the marvel, that he lived. If he wanted to know anything more than that, he was going to have to trace the coroner’s report, the ME’s report…reports from the police officers who had been on the scene, and, if necessary, learn the identity of the two individuals who responsible for that ‘death’. If they had not already been found and brought to justice, Matt would make sure they were now.

“Relative?”

Matt faced the man beside him, business suit suggesting he was no more than another visitor to someone here. The resident of the neighboring plot, Matt presumed, or else someone keeping an eye out here…for anyone who came visiting. Maybe, Matt mused as he rose from his knees, his cane in his hand, waiting for him. He was proof enough that a business suit could disguise what was beneath it, deceive anyone.

“In a manner of speaking,” he mumbled as he brushed off his knees.

“I’m sorry…its just…I haven’t seen anyone here in some time. There used to be a woman…seemed she was here every time I came…Karen I believe…but I haven’t seen her in some time.”

So she had stopped coming. That did not mean she had stopped grieving…but it did mean she was trying to put whatever they had shared behind her. He guessed she had stopped coming because of Claire…

Or maybe she still came but not when this stranger was here.

“You?” He gestured to the maker.

The flutter of the other man’s heartbeat, the hitch in his breathing, the change in his voice when he replied, “My wife,” left no doubt that he spoke the truth.

“I’m sorry.” It explained why he might have bonded, at least superficially, with Karen when she had come here; they shared a common grief, enough surely to warrant the exchange of names.

“Car accident…she never saw it coming.” He sighed, not bothering to ask how the man buried at Matt’s feet had died. Karen had probably already answered that to his satisfaction. “Oliver, by the way.”

Matt sensed the movement in the air, the rustle of the man’s suit, that told him he had offered his hand in introduction. Matt offered his in return, but did not grasp the other man’s hand, playing off his disability as was normally expected. If he took the man’s hand it would raise flags suggesting his blindness was false.

“Matt.” The fact that he shared the first name with the man in the grave might be suspicious, but with no birth or death dates engraved on the stone, the relation between living and deceased could not be clear. Father, uncle, cousin, grandfather. Maybe only friends with the same first name. He hoped Oliver did not ask. He did not have a readily available explanation for something.

“Need a ride anywhere, Matt? My car’s right there…”

“You just arrived…”

“Oh, Felicity understands. I bring her fresh flowers twice a week…just to say hello. We don’t need to talk…she knows everything I’d have to say.”

Matt sensed that to be not entirely true, sensed that Oliver spent more time at his wife’s grave than was healthy. If he chose not to remain here alone tonight, for whatever reason, it was none of Matt’s business. But the grave, the suit, the man’s friendly demeanor were not enough to prompt Matt to trust him for a car trip. It might still be a ruse.

Then again, if it was, wasn’t it worth accepting the offer to learn more?

“The Winston…thank you.”

“No problem.” There was a smile in Oliver’s voice, easy and sincere, that stripped away most of Matt’s doubt.

Following the sound of Oliver’s footsteps upon the gravel path, they left the graves upon the knoll and headed towards the gate. “You live in Hell’s Kitchen?”

“I’m not a native…but I’ve lived here long enough now that it’s home.”

“Not many say that…takes time to overlook the underbelly…”

“Thankfully that darkness is less and less now. I’d heard the horror stories of what the Kitchen use to be…now…it’s not so bad.”

Matt scowled; Oliver had a point. This was not the Hell’s Kitchen Matt had known. The seediness, the blight, the crime that had surrounded him, swarmed the streets like an infestation, belonged to the city of Matt’s past. How it could have changed so much in the past year he had not yet discovered, but in the secret places of his soul he wanted to believe that the sacrifice of his ‘death’ and a lost year of life had been a prime factor into the saving of his city.

It would have been worth all of his current confusion and angst if it was true.

“It’s improved,” he admitted. The steady rhythm of another heart beating ahead of them brought the slightest hesitation in his step, but since Oliver was not stopping, seemed unconcerned, Matt started again. The third individual was not hiding but rather was leaning against what Matt immediately judged to be an expensive car. It was not the normal rumble and rattle of a taxi engine.

If Oliver had a driver, employed full time or hired for the night, he had money enough for an expensive car.

“John, this is Matt. Matt…John Diggle. My best friend.”

Not a driver then. Matt made note of that when the man, who’s stance suggested a military background, said, “Hey.”

“Gonna drop him at the Winston on our way home.”

“You here for the conference?” John opened the door for him as Oliver got into the front passenger side seat. Not his driver, technically, but a driver nonetheless.

“No…I live there.”

The nature of their silence, while fed by the door closing after he sat and the time it took John to get around to the driver’s door, suggested a shared look between the other two men, as if Matt’s admission meant something to them, which once more made him wary, but neither spoke of it as the car started forward, except for Oliver’s remark of, “Must make for a lot of chaos with all those people coming and going.”

“You’re familiar with the conference then?”

“Most of the Kitchen’s abuzz with it,” John said.

“I’ve got company stock in it,” admitted Oliver a bit sheepishly. “Nano-technology…check it out if you get the chance.” He might not be a man prone to boasting, but he was a business man, and if his product was good enough to warrant representation at what seemed to be a very prestigious and selective conference, then he had the right to be proud of it.

It also explained the money for the car.

“It will probably be over my head,” Matt chuckled. He had been an excellent student, hard-studied with a good memory, but science had never been his area of interest, even though it might have explained his blindness and offered a way to restore his sight. By then he had accepted it, had begun to revel in the advantages the loss of his vision had left and he could not bear the thought of false hope. It had been better to live in the reality he was forced into…and to find a way to help as many people as possible find justice in an unfair world.

The Law had been the best avenue to offer that…or so he had believed until the night he finally let the devil loose.

There was no turning back after that.

“It’s over mine too…I just front the company…hold her together while those in the know do the real work, the real inventing.”

Matt heard those stray notes in what had otherwise been a self-deprecating statement, notes of doubt that suggested Oliver believed something was happening beneath his roof that shouldn’t be, that he was not going to approve of when he found it. Matt patted his suit pocket and removed one of the few dozen business cards he’d had printed for the benefit of Logan’s trial. He did not have an office, but he did have a phone number, and on the off chance that Oliver might be able to use his services, Matt handed him the card.

…without thinking about the fact that the name upon it was the same as the one upon the grave he had been visiting.

“I imagine you have a fleet of company lawyers…but if you need an outside, unbiased opinion…”

Oliver glanced at the card, rubbing his finger over the typeface embossed into the high quality cardstock, bold black against stark white, no embellishments only a name, an occupation, a phone number. “Thanks. I may take you up on that offer…”

Or he might not; Matt heard the invisible restraints that he suspected kept Oliver on a path he most often did not want to follow. Maybe he was less the head of the company than he claimed. Perhaps he was head in name only. Either way, Matt would help him if he could. He seemed the sort of man worth helping…as well as a client who could pay.

Maybe he should refer him to Foggy until he got back on his feet. Maybe taking a client was the getting on his feet that Matt needed.

The car stopped at the curb as near to the hotel door as they could get and Oliver got out of the car to get Matt’s door for him. It wasn’t necessary, but Matt appreciated the courtesy of the action. “I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of each other,” Oliver said. “I’m glad we’ve met.”

Perplexed by the sentiment, as if Oliver had been hoping they would meet or perhaps was merely grateful for a legal contact that had no strings attached to his company, Matt unfolded his cane and adjusted his glasses. “So am I.”

“Here…in case you ever need anything…anything at all…” His business card was tucked into Matt’s hand but for the moment, Matt took no opportunity to read it.

“A drink sometime, perhaps?” He could not imagine what else he might need from a business man like Oliver, but he knew the advantages of high powered contacts. Grooming that relationship would someday prove to be in both of their best interests.

“A drink it is. Call me with when and where, and I’ll be there.”

“I will.”

But not tonight. Though the evening was still young, Matt had places to be and so, it seemed, did his new friend, who might otherwise have suggested sharing that drink now. He listened to the car door close, felt the hum of the air as the car pulled away from the curb, and listened to its retreat until he was certain that it was not merely rounding the block with the intent of returning, of following him up to his room…of causing trouble.

Just because he felt a kindred spirit in the stranger, did not mean that he should trust him…even if he did.


	5. 5

It was the Devil, not Matt Murdock, who made his way into the ME’s office, seeking medical reports that could explain the quandary of his life. The man behind the desk was surprisingly compliant, the unspoken possibility of violence seeming to be enough to prompt him to pull up all of the records needed as proof. That he was also surprised to see the Devil before him was obvious.

Matt quickly realized that if he had been ‘dead’ no one had seen Daredevil in nearly a year. That would explain the surprise.

“Cause of death?” the Devil rumbled. He wasn’t near enough to the desk to read paper files, lingering as he was in the shadows of the dimly lit corridor, and the computer screen faced away from him. It made the need for the clerk to read it to him a logical thing

“I remember this one…poor sod…” Keys clacked, the computer hard drive whirred, and the fellow nervously tapped his fingers on the desk as he waited for the information to be displayed on the screen.

“Was there something unusual about the case? His death?”

“Yeah…like…who the hell runs a blind man through with a sword…and what in God’s name was a blind man doing in his boxers in Central Park?”

Matt scowled. Central Park wasn’t exactly part of Hell’s Kitchen, but it wasn’t so far off either, and the likelihood of having pursued someone that far was always high. For Karen and Foggy to have witnessed the attack, however, meant that they had been there as well, and Matt was curious as to why.

“Boxers?”

“Yep…figured the killers musta wanted his clothes…can’t think of no other reason for it. Dunno why they felt it necessary to shoot him in the neck as well…after the stabbing…already bleeding out at that point. No way he could have lived through that blade between his limbs…puncturing his lung.

“What type of sword?”

“Hmm…let’s see…” The desk attendant slid his finger down the computer screen, the sound suggesting he had been eating something sticky with his hands. “Unusually sharp…carved…unusual metal…says here it was judged to be a Japanese katana…”

The Hand. There was no one else it could have been. Although why the Hand had resorted to sealing the deal with a bullet…why the bullet had been to his throat and not to his head…were questions remaining to be answered. He could, however extrapolate both answers…the added certainty of his death…and the protection his helmet afforded him. He had never tested whether the helmet’s material would stop a bullet, particularly at close range, and even Melvin had not been able to assure him that it was bullet proof.

The assassins wanted to be thorough…but why not just decapitate him? And had there been something about that night, or the days and events leading up to it, that had led to his arrival in Havensport? The Hand was the connection…which meant likely the Yakuza as well. Perhaps that was where he needed to start looking for his murder.

“And you’re sure he was dead? No one stole the body or tampered with it? It was correctly identified?”

“Stole the…our security’s too good for that.” The level of defensiveness in the man’s voice suggested that bodies had been stolen or otherwise gone missing in the past, but his honest certainty when he continued with, “There was no tampering. He was identified and claimed by his friends for burial…released to Foster and Sons out on 45th…of 9th…ask them if you don’t believe me…talk to his friends.”

I will, Matt thought with a silent grumble. “Nothing else unusual? Noteworthy?”

The fellow shook his head. “Not that it says here…and I wasn’t working that night. Rich was the attending ME that night…but the poor guy suffered a stroke after his son’s accident and had to step down so you won’t be able to ask him…”

“When was this…the accident? The stroke?”

“Kid’s accident was what…seven months ago I’d say. Struck by a baseball during practice…cranial hemorrhaging. Nasty, unfortunate business. Rich fought with the missus all the time after that…about a month and a half later he got hit with a stroke in his shower. Missus found him…but he ain’t been the same since. Doesn’t talk, doesn’t move…just stares.”

Wondering if there were any poisonous agents that could mimic the symptoms of a stroke that were not noticeable in a tox screen unless someone knew what to look for…or had reason to look…Matt scowled. Both deaths could have been entirely innocent, unconnected to his own ‘death’ and eventual ‘resurrection’, but Matt wasn’t going to know unless he dug deeper. This was the sort of investigating he needed Karen for, the sort of thing she was good at finding, but how did he dare ask for her help when it would reopen wounds that were finally beginning to heal?

Maybe he would present it to her tomorrow, with the caveat that she was not obligated to help him if she would rather not. If he had to do the leg work himself, he would, but it was going to take him a lot longer that way to get to the bottom of this mystery.

“Do you have the name of the officers on duty that night…who took the call?”

“Thompson and Torelli…15th Precinct station…”

Again Matt scowled. 15th Precinct station was too far away from where his body had fallen for it to be one of their normal duty calls. What had put those two cops in that place at the right time? Coincidence…or something more sinister.

A visit to the station was in order, some way of tracking the two officers down and learning what he could of them, finding out what they knew, what they saw…who they were connected to that might have given them a reason to be on hand.

After thanking the attendant for his help, though still feeling skeptical about details that felt, to him, to be missing from the report, Matt stole back into the night, taking to the high ground where he could move rooftop to rooftop towards the familiar precinct office where the one officer he remembered no longer worked. The outside, at least, looked the same…cleaner, with new paint and shinier locks and handles and latches on the doors and windows. The cars sounded different, newer, and the rustle of the officers’ uniforms sounded as though they were made of different fabric now, Perched above the rear door, he listened to the comings and goings of the officers and staff, the chatter of those within, the on and off wail of sirens as calls brought cars to the station or took them out again, the expected foul language of criminals and cops alike as they engaged in the typical give and take dance of power. He waited for mentions of the needed names, not willing to risk going inside or approaching any of those who came out of the building when he did not know them…not tonight at least…and when it came, 47th and 10th, Hell’s Kitchen Park, it was another race across town to arrive there, he hoped, while both men were still there investigating a report of shots fired.

A typical gang scuffle in a park better manicured and maintained than Matt had ever known it, and though there was a crowd of onlookers gathered for questioning, and a man with a heavy Hispanic accent covered with gang tattoos, noted by one of the officers, on the ground in cuffs at his feet, at least it seemed there had been no injuries; any other parties involved had fled the scene. There were too many people about for Matt to separate the officers for his own questioning, but all it would take was a good vantage point and the opportunity to listen to give Matt some idea of the sort of officers he was dealing with…point him in the direction of the one most likely to talk to him. He climbed higher onto the tallest nearby building, continuing to listen to the questioning, the spewed Spanish curses, and the chatter of the witnesses as he made his ascent.

Only to find that here, on this rooftop, he was not alone.

The unexpected intrusion was enough to break the other man’s concentration, enough for him to lift his eyes from the rifle sight with no expectation of who he might find. A tenant coming up to smoke or take a hit, a couple hoping to score beneath the clear night sky, an officer somehow tipped to his location and expecting now to make an arrest or keep him from doing what he had come here to do.

It should have been done already. It wasn’t his fault that his target got into a scuffle with the drug courier he had been there to meet, or that a fist fight ending in shots exchanged between would result in his target being too damn hard to hit.

He was a marksman. He could have taken the shot. But he had changed over the past year, changed by two people, both of whom he had lost. He’d gotten his vengeance, but after that, the actual act of killing had held less appeal. He still did it; it was his way, his calling, and he never felt sorry for those lives he took. Red had his way of cleaning up the city, Frank had his, and Frank still believed his way was best. But he was more cautious now, and if, on the rare occasion, he could stop someone permanently without killing them…well he was okay with making that call.

In this instance, he could have made the hit if not for that crowd. He was a lot of things, but a killer of innocent women and children wasn’t one of them. Not after the loss of his own family. With his target now being taken into custody facing an assault charge, or murder charge…assuming they could track down the fellow he had shot, at this moment, taking a shot that could injure the innocent wasn’t necessary. He would take one when, if, he could, erase the dirt bag and his stench from Hell’s Kitchen’s street, and then get onto his next job…or a good night’s sleep.

The man standing some twenty five feet away from him, however, fists clenched at his sides in a familiar stance, his head tilted just so in order that the tiny nubby horns upon his helmet were silhouetted against the nearby light of a billboard, momentarily erased the target from his mind.

“Red…is that you?”

The question knocked Matt internally off balance. The man before him, smelling of military grade gun oil, munitions, and perspiration beneath the heavy layers of leather and body armor he wore, the man removing his finger from the trigger of the gun he had been aiming and lowering it from its position on the roof wall, seemed to recognize him…no…KNOW him…but there were no morsels in Matt’s memory that recognized the smell of him, the sound of his voice and heartbeat, the sound of his clothes as his body turned to face him completely.

“Put the gun down…”

The stranger was already doing so, not out of compliance but it seemed out of some sense of respect, perhaps even friendship, between them.

“I saw you die, Red…right in front of my eyes…no one should be able to live through wounds like those…”

Matt scowled. “What do you know of that? You saw what happened?”

“Saw it? Hell…I was there…don’t you remember? Put ‘em both down but not before they…”

“So I know you?”

“Frank. Castle.” Gun now on the rooftop at his feet, he took a step closer, a non-threatening gesture but, when made by Frank Castle, always had a hint of menace to the steps that frightened a lot of people from getting too close. Not Daredevil, however. Not Matt Murdock. The blind man was never afraid of him. It had allowed them to form a grudging sort of friendship, marred by the simple fact that killing some criminals was a necessity to Frank. “We had some great tussles…but were working on putting that behind us…for the sake of Hell’s Kitchen and Karen…”

So he knew Karen too. From the tone of Frank’s voice, it sounded like he had been more than a little smitten with her. Had he and Matt been rivals? Friends? Matt thought he detected, in the notes of that statement, that Karen might not have even known of Frank’s feelings and he regretted that…or maybe regretted what had come after.

Sensing no trace of recognition even to the mention of his name, Frank sighed. “Guess that shot scrambled you good…know how that is. But…if you’re alive…who the hell did they bury?”

“I’ve been asking the same question.” The flashing of lights, or in Matt’s case the click click of lights switching colors, announced the arrival of a third police vehicle. The officers within it, a man with too much perfumed musk and a woman with cigarette smoke permeating the air around her, took over the questioning of the slowly dwindling crowd as the first two officers hauled their suspect off the ground and shoved him into their car. Frank watched the commotion, scolding himself for missing what would have been the perfect shot, when his target’s back was exposed, the officers on either side of him, the crowd now behind them, far enough away to allow a shot that would have removed his objective and spared the lives of the innocent. But if he was honest with himself, taking that shot was less important than conversation with the man before him. “Seems my body made it as far as the ME’s office…but after…”

He shrugged. “Did you see me there? At the morgue…at the…?”

“Nah…I was gonna strip you…fast…didn’t want the cops to find you like you are now…but by the time I got down from the roof, Nelson and Karen were already…” He scrubbed his hand back over his close shaved scalp. “I took the suit from them for safe keeping…took to ground for a while. They were looking for the shooter after all. From the scanners…they were much more worried about finding me then finding out what had happened to you. I looked…I tried to find the truth…but no one knew anything…”

“Yakuza…The Hand…” Matt assumed Frank knew about both.

Sighing again, Franks slumped down with his back against the wall that encompassed this particular rooftop. Torelli and Simpson were lost to Matt for tonight, but he would find them again, if not tonight than tomorrow night. Now that he knew their shift, and at least this corner of their beat, it shouldn’t be too difficult to track them down again. With them gone and the additional officers beginning to canvas the nearby buildings for clues as to where the gunshot victim had gone…a man fleeing on foot not in a car, the goings on below mattered little to Matt now.

“That’s what I thought…the sword, you know…but it wasn’t them. The Yakuza skipped town, or went so far underground after I purged a number of them…they’ve been mostly unheard of since. I didn’t get to see the bodies of the pair…the cops showed up not long after Nelson and Karen left the scene with your clothes…so I couldn’t get close. Scanners claimed a manhunt for a single shooter…someone with gun and sword matching my description…those two didn’t even make it into the morgue as John Does.”

Matt had already sat as well, taking less opportunity of being seen with the short wall to hide him. What Frank was saying suggested some degree of corruption within law enforcement or someone with enough influence and money to order his death, steal bodies and manipulate evidence reports. He did not want to initiate another shakedown of the police department, but it might come to that, depending on the outcome of his little chats with Simpson and Torelli.

“I’m glad you got them…whoever they were.” Was he glad they were dead and missing instead of arrested for questioning? No. But he was grateful they were unable to harm either Karen or Foggy or Claire, and grateful that, whoever they were connected with had apparently had no reason, yet, to do just that.

“Sure thing, Red.” Frank felt no need to point out Matt’s acceptance of the guilty men’s deaths. Seeing as they had seemingly ‘killed’ him, at least cost him a significant portion of memories and time, Frank did not blame him for finding any satisfaction or relief in those two deaths.

“That what brings you here?”

Head cocked, Matt asked, “What?”

“Here…tonight. Those are the cops who were first on the scene…who handled your death. I remember their voices.” Frank remembered more than that, about one of the two at least, but he didn’t think it was worth mentioning right now. More than once he had considered shaking down those officers too, but for a variety of reasons, he had not. “Want some help with that? Divide and conquer?”

Having no proof that he actually knew this man, let alone was friends with him on any level, Matt considered the offer. Maybe one or both of those officers had information that could help him…and someone, learning that Matt was looking for answers, had sent Frank to kill them. The only person that might have deduced his quest for Simpson and Torelli would be the ME night clerk, but as there had been no duplicity or dishonesty in his exchange with the Devil earlier that night, Matt did not think that could be true. Maybe Frank was the shooter the police had come here looking for, and the man they were arresting was innocent.

Digging deeper into Frank and his identity might prove the point one way or the other, and keeping him close in the meantime was probably a wise precaution.

“I can get their addresses…split them up tomorrow?”

Matt nodded. “Meet at the 50th street station…roof…9:30.”

“Nine thirty…I’ll be there.” Frank opened his thermos, scowled, and glanced at the sky. “Gonna be getting light before too much longer…and I’m out of coffee. My mark’s in custody now…so I’ll catch you tomorrow.” He got to his feet, offered his hand, and gave a sideways smirk when Matt accepted the offer to pull him up. “It’s damn good to see you, Red. I know we’ve had our differences…still do…but I never wanted you…” He shook his head and began packing up his rifle and gear. “Karen know you’re back?”

“Saw her earlier…”

“Bit of a shock I imagine…least it was for me…you two were pretty tight once…” Though not, Frank thought to himself, as tight as either of them had believed at the time. The few tarnished chinks between them were the things that had given Frank hope, but those fragments of hope had been taken away with Matt’s murder. “She’s doing good? I try to look out for her…but she doesn’t…”

“She blame you too?”

“Hard not to…after everything the police and the media were saying. Thought she knew me better than that…but this was your life we’re talking about…she needed someone to blame.” There was a broken sound to his voice, his words, that made Matt’s heart ache. “Guess it had to be me.”

“Now that I’m…she’ll come around.” With Claire in the picture, what Karen would come around too was unclear, but she might, at least forgive Frank and accept that none of this had been his doing.

“Maybe so, Red.” He slung his gun case over his shoulder and headed for the stairs down into the building. “See you around…tomorrow night.”

“Tomorrow night,” Matt agreed. He had questions, he had directions, but now he needed a few hours of sleep or he’d miss the others tomorrow. He was going to need a fresh set of senses if he was to keep up the search for exactly what had happened to him, why, and why he could not remember any of it.


	6. 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As part of a "Name Challenge" on one_million_words on LJ, I was given 6 random names...so some miscellaneous characters appear in this chapter.

Dawn would be there soon. Though the sky was still dark, the increase of traffic in the street below the balcony heralded the arrival of the new day, the only thing that reminded Jack that he had not slept a wink. That, and the stale beer in his hand that was, and shortly the sound of movement in the room behind him and the eventual aroma of strong coffee announced the start of the day but gave him no impetus to go back inside. The sixth floor balcony of the O’Brian apartment was high enough that the smell of the streets was less strong here, the air almost fresh, and though he had not meant to stay here last night, had not intended to come for more than a shared drink, the choice between company and drinking himself into oblivion had been an easy one to make. He wanted to keep a clear head about him. He needed to, if he was to think his way out of the problem he had to sort.

Not that he had many choices. Chloe had been quick to point that out to him the night before. He could stay at Tigh Ard and face down Carl, move back in with Rachel, or get a place of his own…in Havensport or elsewhere. Chloe had more than a few contacts that she could use to line him up a job, if he wanted to remain in New York near her. Hell, she could probably get him into the New York CTU office if he wanted to go back to that life.

He was done with that life, however. He was tired of risking his life for an organization, for people, who would just as soon turn on him and sell him out to the same enemies he tried to protect them from. Personal security, perhaps. Security consultant. He and Chloe and Morris together would probably do a helluva good business in that line of work…if they chose to.

Jack wasn’t sure he wanted to go down that path.

“You’re still here.”

Chloe handed him one of the two cups of coffee she carried, took the beer from him to set on the small balcony table, and then leaned on the rail beside him. She smelled clean, freshly showered, the scents of her shampoo and soap exactly the way Jack remembered them. They would never be a couple, they weren’t that sort of a fit. But as co-workers, they made one hell of a team, and Jack was always relieved to have her at his back.

“Didn’t intend to be. It’s just so…peaceful here…”

She laughed as the sound of another siren wailed in the distance. “Real peaceful.” Compared to Havesnport, this was nothing but chaos, but maybe he found this sort of droning background noise soothing to his chaotically jumbled thoughts.

One corner of his mouth lifted into a smirk as he brought the cup to his mouth. The scent of the coffee alone perked his mood.

“Been thinking?”

“Been trying not to,” he admitted. He couldn’t change who held his papers; that wasn’t up to him and he didn’t think it mattered. But choosing where to live, forced to choose between two families, two women…that wasn’t a choice he wanted to make…especially when one had not been honest with him and the other had to answer to someone else. The easiest solution, the best one, was setting up a place of his own, but he was not yet convinced that he wanted to do that either.

“You never stop thinking…that’s your problem.” She knew Jack’s mind to be a busy place, always observing, always planning, always alert. “I’m off to work soon…Morris will be too…stay as long as you want…help yourself to breakfast…just wash up and make sure you lock up when you leave.”

“Thanks…” Seeing the sights was still on his agenda for the day, but he was not in any hurry to rush off to greet the world. The sun hadn’t even cleared the horizon yet.

“You got my number if you need anything?”

“Of course.”

Of course he did. Her number was never far from his reach, one of the few he had memorized as he never knew when he would need her expertise. It wasn’t like he would need to reach her for a day of sightseeing…but he always felt better for having it on hand.

And though Chloe would never admit it, she always felt better for him having it too.

*

The main convention room floor of the Winston was already packed by the time Cassie reached, with men and women being checked at the door for attendance credentials and recording devices, video, photo or voice, of any kind. She had always been an early riser; the military had made her even more so. Quick glance around her suggested that most of the others up at this early hour were military or ex-military too. Like her, they had either eaten breakfast in their rooms, since the dining room had not been open early enough to allow this, or else, like Cassie, they had skipped breakfast in favor of strong coffee and the complimentary breakfast pastries on a table in the lobby.

The level of security for the convention hall was slightly irritating, but waiting in line was easily endured. If nothing else, time served in the special forces unit she had worked her ass off to get into had taught her the benefits of patience, taught her how to wait without growing lax in attention. It was without surprise, therefore, that she noted the man approaching her and smiled when he reached her.

“Bloody early for this, isn’t it? Whose idea was it to open the doors at…”

“Back of the line,” a surly, less than friendly looking fellow behind Cassie growled. The badge bearing the name Benny Harris, instead of Benjamin, belied his efforts to appear professional and intimidating

Hunter smiled easily, finding it difficult to take the man seriously. “I’m with her, mate…” he said, hooking his arm around Cassie’s waist as if it was meant to be there.

Cassie had been about to say something equally reprimanding to the line jumper, but when the stranger snarled and said, “She’s not even one of us…” in a demeaning tone, she decided to let Hunter stay right where he was. Her smile, as she returned his gesture with an arm about him as well, was given with a challenging glint in her eyes. The stranger might be military, an army corpsman judging by the insignia he wore and made sure everyone saw, but she knew very well he wouldn’t have the training she’d had. If he wanted to pick a fight with a woman smaller and lighter than he was, she was more than willing to oblige.

“Careful, mate…” Hunter nodded. “You don’t want to cross this one…trust me…”

By then they had reached the door to show their ID, and any brewing fight was aborted.

As soon as they stepped into the convention hall, however, Cassie’s arm fell away. “I didn’t expect you’d be here this early.” She clipped the number badge the door attendant had given her to her lapel and picked up a convention floor map and a folder of pamphlets from the table just inside the door 

“If I miss even one display…one demonstration…boss is going to have my hide.” He might have been jesting or he might have been serious. Cassie did not know him well enough to say, and as with most comments he gave, there was a flippant air about his words that kept that ambiguity always at the fore.

“You signed up for the discs, right?”

“As I understand it, they’ll have the individual demonstrations and lectures…but I don’t know about any of this…” He waved his hand towards the booths before them. “Would seem damn silly for them to disallow photos and videos if they’re just going to provide a video tour later…”

“And I wager that most of what’s here…other agencies and companies probably have their own research teams on similar projects…so not sure what there is to hide.”

“Suppose we’ll see as we go. Shall we?”

There was no harm in accepting his company, and the dialogue to debate and discuss what they saw would likely prove as informative as the displays themselves, so Cassie nodded. They turned towards the left most row and started there, intending to see what could be seen before the first lecture at nine. Hunter’s company would be welcome for at least that long.

By Hunter’s call, he would have her company a good deal longer.

*

Karen, sandwiched in the lecture hall between a small ferret of a man with Clarence Torres scrawled in shaking handwriting across his name badge and a sophisticated bespeckled blonde of indeterminate age who rapidly jotted down every word the speaker said on blank pages with the name Marjorie Cunningham printed in a crisp, bold type face at the top, was beginning to think she did not belong here. She was no doctor, knew little about medicine or the science behind it, and the thin man behind the microphone, pale and bald with skin that either clung to his skeleton or sagged in places as the gravity of age took its toll, was disconcerting to behold. If not for his wide articulated hand movements that punctuated or underscored everything he said, or the piercing gaze of his dark eyes, he seemed a living corpse to her already, but Doctor Michael Kozlov was part of the reason Karen was here. It was rumored he had been captured by the Germans in World War 2 and pressed into service in one of the eastern front’s death camps, his research into the chemistry and neurology of the human body lending itself easily to the Nazi quest for ways to enhance their soldiers. Some documents indicated he had served them willingly, others placed him in the service of the Russian war machine and still others placed him in England and in the United States after the war. There was photo evidence to suggest each was true, but as it would make the man nearly one hundred years old now, it seemed unlikely that this could be the same man…or that he could have been in each place he had been rumored to be. A father, an uncle, a cousin or brother perhaps, men who shared knowledge within the family, but he could not possibly be the same man.

Then again, as ancient as his features appeared now as she listened to him speak about the chemical composition of the human genome and how it could theoretically be altered or enhanced, she was beginning to believe he was everything the rumors claimed him to be.

She didn’t know the accuracy of his claims, but she did understand why he was working in conjunction with Dr. Alvarez now. If clone genetics could be modified, as had already been proven, was already done, what was to prevent a similar process from working on humans? Was it, as Karen was setting out to prove, already being tested, already being done?

The poor unfortunate souls who had ended up in Claire’s care, disfigured and mentally unbalanced, barely more than vegetables or wild beasts, suggested it was. They weren’t clones…but they hadn’t exactly been men either. The cases had been hushed up by the hospital administration and the patients spirited away as soon as they popped up, and though the official explanation was that they had been transferred to facilities better able to manage each one’s particular problem, the whole matter was unusual enough to raise red flags for Claire…and enough to send Karen on a quest for answers. If someone was experimenting on humans, they needed to be stopped.

The hope was that Alvarez would have answers, or at least enough answers to point Karen in a direction and to satisfy Claire’s concerns for the well-being of those taken too soon from her care. Alvarez was reluctantly willing to talk, but only anonymously…and in private.

And taking notes from Kozlov’s lecture now, the prickles of discomfort that raced up and down Karen’s spine suggested that Kozlov just might be the reason for Alvarez’ reluctance.

She glanced at her watch. Nearly three o’clock. She would rejoin Claire for the day’s final event, a panel discussion between Doctor Alvarez, Colonel Arthur Grishin, and a Doctor Dorothea Rushing, a research specialist with a Roxxon subsidiary company about the ethical implications of enhancing soldiers for combat. It was expected to be a crowded event, one that had required signing up for in advance, and only Claire’s association with Alvarez had gotten them seats. The possibility of if turning into extended, contentious debate was high and, Karen had judged by the talk of many convention guests throughout the day, even hoped for. Doctor Rushing had a history of controversial animal research projects that kept her name in the news, but Colonel Grishin was a man with a long, though rather unremarkable , military record. If anything, it was remarkable because he had reached the rank of colonel at a young age for unspecified, possibly classified, reasons and had retained it for so long. Karen had been unable to find anything that qualified him to be part of the panel, save for his rank and a past association with Kozlov. It was a relationship written of in passing in several documents Karen had found, but they had never photographed together, and public records of events both were said to have attended never listed both names in attendance.

The sparseness of Grishin’s military record suggested to Karen that he was more than he appeared to be, but what that was, she could only speculate.

“Isn’t he fabulous?” chirped the man to her left, a sound that, to Karen, was the definitive squeal of a fangirl…or boy in this case. He was clutching a book to his chest, something thick with Kozlov’s skeletal visage on the back, a book Karen knew the man had written but had not had the desire to read. The excerpts she had found had been too dry and technical for her.

“Do you think he will sign that?” Ms. Cunningham asked, pulling her own copy of the book from her handbag. “Take photos?”

As others were starting to rise as Kozlov left the podium, both Torres and Cunninham did to, the woman pushing past Karen to hustle with Torres towards the stage in the hopes of getting the desired autographs

Karen shuddered and shook her head as she hastily retreated from the room in search of Claire. The further she got from Kozlov, the better she would feel.

“Miss Page?”

She drew up short at the stranger speaking her name. A handsome man with military bearing, whose black hair was a little too long for a standard military cut and whose bronzed flawless skin and brilliant white smile made him too perfect, in Karen’s opinion, to be a soldier, had fallen into step beside her. The clipboard in his hand displayed a list of names but she got no more than a glimpse of them before he peeled a sticker from a page there and stuck it to her name tag.

“What is this, Mister…” She read his name tag, “Hawes.” Noting his first name, she smiled slightly. Rodrigo always sounded like a model’s name to her, not a soldier’s. He certainly looked like a Rodrigo.

“You’ve been selected for the special product demonstration. Congratulations.”

She blinked in surprised. All of the attendees were eligible for that unveiling, but only two dozen would be selected to attend. As a random lottery, with nearly six hundred attendees to draw from, she had no reason to expect to be chosen, and little reason to desire to be. Unless it somehow pertained to Alvarez’ work, or Kozlov’s, she was not particularly interested.

“We will meet at the back of the Blue South Conference room after the panel discussion…”

“But I can’t…” Her plans for the evening, the interview with Alvarez, dinner afterwards with Matt and Foggy were more important to her than some random lottery for a secret product unveiling.

Rodrigo smiled again, a smile Karen was sure was enough to sway anyone’s inclination to refuse “You’ll have the opportunity to decline when we meet. Please be there; we have to follow protocol.”

“Alright,” she stammered, made dizzy by that smile, so much so that, even when he had moved away in search of any other selected winners, she did not move for several minutes despite being jostled about by other attendees who moved past her.

“You got one too?” Claire’s excitement as she joined her shook Karen out of her daze.

“One what?”

“Spot in the lottery. See?” Her finger pointed to the blue and red star logo on the sticker on her name tag, the same one Karen sported.

“But Doctor Alvarez…”

“I’m sure we can reschedule. Come on…we might be able to catch him before the panel. We can’t miss this opportunity.”

“You think it’s that important?” It had to be, for Claire to be that excited by it.

“Everyone’s speculating about what it is…we’ll be the first to see. From what I’ve heard, it’s one of the biggest medical breakthroughs of the century. Of course it’s important.”

Claire’s enthusiasm won out. “Let’s find Alvarez,” Karen agreed. “Then call Foggy and let him know the change of plans.” At the very least, she imagined dinner would have to be delayed and she did not want him and Matt showing up and waiting for them, worrying about where they might be.

*

“Sure, Ruth…I will call you as soon as we’re done here. Be home soon.” John Diggle flipped his phone closed and shoved it into his pocket. In the days of smartphones with touch screens, he preferred his flip phone, stubbornly holding on to it in a refusal to modernize any further. He might live amidst the high tech world Oliver and Ruth had built together, but he didn’t have to adapt to it more than he already had. It was that stubbornness that Ruth Brooks loved about him, and if nothing else, he refused to change because it pleased her.

When the woman, a paraplegic from birth, had become the lucky winner of a two million dollar lottery, and the recipient of her uncle’s significant estate…including the high tech research company she had renamed to Queen Enterprises, some of her money had gone immediately into the creation, the purchase, of two clones…Oliver and John. Oliver to run the company, as she had little head for business, and John because…well, that had been for much more selfish reasons, as she fancied the man from the moment she had first seen him. He protected her as much as he did Oliver, and thus protected her company. He owed her his life, literally, and in the three years they had known each other he had grown to love her as much as he had loved Lila in his canon life.

He should have gone home to her, now that his and Oliver’s tour of the conference was complete. Despite Oliver’s suspicions that something was amiss in Queen Enterprises, the company’s booth only displayed the current work they were undertaking meant to help the paralyzed gain the gift of movement again, the main focus of their research, involving robotics, genetic modification, and cellular regrowth and enhancement. There was nothing there that Oliver did not already know about, and so they had decided to call it a day, John to head home, Oliver to continue his ‘research’ on his own terms.

Though aware of the ‘special event’ the conference’s hosts were presenting, Oliver had not tried to bribe or buy his way into it. He was planning to get access to it on his own terms. When the young man with the too perfect smile had cornered them to announce that John’s name had been chosen in the lottery, it had come as a surprise to both of them. They’d had to have badge numbers like everyone else to get in, but neither Oliver nor John had thought that entitled them to the lottery.

“You don’t have to do this, John. Go home to Ruth.”

“This is what you wanted, Oliver…eyes on the inside. If there’s anything going on behind this secret…”

“I didn’t say there was anything going on…”

John gave him a look. Oliver hadn’t shared his suspicions, but John knew him too well. If Oliver wasn’t suspicious, his alter ego wouldn’t be planning to stake out the secret event.

“You don’t even know where it’s going to be…”

“I assume…”

“Assuming isn’t as good as a man on the inside. You can track me…and I can tell you what I see. If it’s just a bunch of science types bumping elbows, you’ll know that too…and if it’s something more…”

“Then you’ll get out of there and leave it to me…”

“We’ll do it together, Oliver. You and me.” Oliver could be stubborn that way, not wanting to risk his friend’s life, but John would have none of it, and despite his efforts to the contrary, Oliver knew better. They were in this life together, had each other’s backs. They would go down fighting together if necessary.

Even Ruth knew that to be true and accepted that risk every time she let John out of her sight.

Oliver uttered a perturbed sigh but nodded. “Give me twenty…” Everything Oliver needed was in the trunk of the car and the compartment on his motorcycle. He just needed time enough to get to it and suit up.

Glancing at his watch, a more sophisticated bit of equipment than his phone, John nodded. “I’ll give you as long as I can.” He had thirty minutes before the lottery winners were to gather in Blue Room South. That ought to give Oliver plenty of time to get ready.

*

“Well would you look at this…”

Cassie was not as surprised as she might have been when Hunter spotted her in the slowly growing group of people at the back of Blue Room South, waved and shouted at her across the room, and began elbowing his way through the milling crowd to join her. They had been separated earlier in the day, their personal interests in the various lectures drawing them in different directions, but she fully expected him to find her come dinner time. He had taken a shine to her, it seemed clear to her, and she enjoyed his company, and though she had pointed out to him that she was spoken for, it did not hinder his efforts to spend time with her. Maybe he was just lonely…or stubborn and persistent…but so long as he didn’t get too out of line, she welcomed having someone around to talk to. She had spotted him across the lecture hall when the panel had begun but afterwards had been too interested in listening to the debate about enhancing soldiers in the field for efficiency and performance versus the risks of trying such untested methods on humans and whether or not field tests on clones was an acceptable substitute to prove compatibility with human soldiers.

As Clan, as mistress of her own small house, as a soldier who had seen her share of shit for one so young, she was all for making the life of a soldier better, safer…but not at the expense of clones or those who were genetically different already.

When she had been given a winning lottery number, she was convinced that her ‘luck’ had nothing to do with luck at all but rather some connection to the Bruce name and in particular to her relationship to Admiral Richard Thorne. Knowing her father would want her to attend, to learn of things few others were being shown, she welcomed the opportunity, but she had not expected Lance Hunter to be selected as well.

It surely could not be a coincidence. She didn’t really believe in coincidence…or fate. Things happened for a reason, and his joining her now had a reason.

Those with her were an interesting collection of faces. She was among the youngest, with the oldest looking to be in his early forties. Men and women, soldiers and scientists and medical personnel alike, clone and human. Three others were Clan, two Sentinels and a Guide. One young woman, however, barely older than Cassie, looked out of place as she fidgeted and shifted nervously from foot to foot, her blue eyes scanning the crowd as if searching for someone. Cassie knew the woman’s face, though she could not be sure of her name; the trouble with clones was that their faces could belong to any number of people…and most did not appreciate being mistaken for someone they were not.

“Cassie Bruce,” she said, offering her hand, less to avoid Hunter’s enthusiastic greeting then to make this stranger feel at ease.

“Karen Page.”

Cassie nodded. So she was right. There was more than a few men around Tigh Ard that would have loved to set their sights on this one. It was a good thing, she thought with an internal chuckle, that none of them were here.

It also proved that not everyone in this group was militarily or medically oriented. Having a member of the press amongst them suggested that whatever this secret was, it was about to be made public…

…if the lottery committee even knew she was press. Or maybe she was a legal aide. That might be even better.

Karen suddenly waved at someone across the room, and Cassie craned her head to see who, not sure who she expected to see. The face she spotted was a familiar one from Karen’s world, the Night Nurse some of the guys had called her, but not one Cassie would have expected to connect to Karen. She was the one, however, who fit into this conference from a medical point of view, and despite the distance between them, when the crowd shifted, Cassie noted the lottery sticker on her name badge as well.

This evening was getting more interesting by the moment.

Claire waved back, pointed towards the stage at the front of the room, where the panelists were gathering up their notes and answering the questions of those gathered around them. Knowing that Claire intended to make apologies to Doctor Alvarez and reschedule their interview, Karen nodded back at her and relaxed.

“Lance.” Hunter took it upon himself to initiate the introduction since Cassie had not.

“Nice to meet you both.” Karen picked up that the two knew each other, though it wasn’t obvious that they had just met the evening before. Hunter was too familiar and easy going with Cassie so that it looked like they had known each other for a long time…perhaps were even a couple…or a past couple, given the distance Cassie tried to keep between herself and Hunter. “Do you know anything about this big secret?”

“Nope…suppose we shall see soon enough.”

The fellow Rodrigo joined them, took a quick headcount, and though he came up a few people short, there were still five minutes to spare. He was on a schedule and required to stick to it. “If you would all follow me, we’ll be ready to leave shortly…”

“Leave?”

Cassie looked at the large dark-skinned man across the crowd, another face she recognized, meaning another clone. That made at least five in the group, possibly others she did not recognize. Experience in the field made her take a headcount of her own, notated for the groups composition of males and females, clone and human, Clan and non-Clan. It was habit, and if the entire group was to be on the move, a habit that would help make sure everyone was accounted for along the way.

“Of course, Mr. Diggle. This isn’t something that could be transported and displayed here. The facility isn’t far…the bus is waiting for us. We will board in five minutes; hopefully everyone is here by then.” Rodrigo began to herd the group towards the exit door near the stage and Karen tried her best to get Claire’s attention, to alert her to the change in location. Claire was deep in conversation with Doctor Alvarez, however, and did not see her, and Karen pouted anxiously as she shuffled along beside Cassie. The tall fellow, Mr. Diggle was on his phone, frowning as he spoke to someone on the other end, and Hunter had a possessive grip on Cassie’s elbow, as if he wanted to protect her from some unforeseen danger.

There was no reason to anticipate trouble, however, and most of the group talked excitedly amongst themselves about what sort of marvel they were about to be the first to see. This was an honor for most, and many had notepads or notetaking apps on their phones at the ready to record any details they were allowed to note. Though she remained alert and watchful of the group, Cassie chose to follow the example of the majority and not that of the more paranoid few. Beyond that paranoia, she had not yet seen anything worth being frightened over. The military, and most research companies, were always secretive with new finds, with potential breakthrough’s or new technology, sometimes to protect the money invested in the work, sometimes to protect the worth itself, sometimes to avoid controversy and public scrutiny. Each reason had its validity, but that did not mean trouble.

There were too many of them. If anything went awry, there were too many witnesses, too many who know where they were. No one wanted the backlash of negative publicity.

*

Torelli sipped at his coffee before capping the thermos and tucking it back into the holder he had jury-rigged into their unmarked squad car dash. Simpson was eating his fourth donut now, and nursing his third Red Bull, making Torelli nauseous and jittery just to watch it. He did not know why there were seated here, parked within visual distance of the Winston Hotel, watching the door of a nearby apartment complex. The tip off about Bobby D, a Hell’s Kitchen drug runner for the Irish dock boys had come from some dubious anonymous source, but the chief had thought it worth a stake out and had parked Will and Tomas on it. Punishment was what it was, Torelli thought, although for what he couldn’t guess. There hadn’t been a blemish on their record since that blindman thing last year, and even that had not been their fault. They’d happened to be in the area, having attended Torelli’s nephew’s championship little league game and the subsequent pizza and, for the adults, beer.

Maybe he and Simpson had downed a few too many beers when they should have been on the job. Maybe, since the day off had been cleared with the chief neither of them should have stuck their nose into the reported Central Park shooting. Maybe they shouldn’t have let that rooftop shooter, whoever the son of a bitch had been, slip through their fingers.

Maybe he should have left well enough alone when two of the dead men turned up missing. Sure maybe their bodies had been claimed by kin thanks to some internal paperwork screw up…but it had not been his, or Simpsons…and though they had pushed hard to correct that mistake, whosevers it had been, at Torelli’s insistence, they had been slapped down and told in very clear terms to let it be.

Officially it was said they had screwed up enough, that someone else in IA had been tasked with finding the missing corpses, but Torelli knew the truth.

The existence of those two men, whomever they had been, was simply erased from evidence. Bodies, weapons, every trace of them was gone. Nothing ever went to trial, for the lone shooter who was believed responsible had never been caught, and so the case was left cold, out of Torelli’s hands.

Simpson had eventually convinced him to let it go. It was one blind man, a small time lawyer, as it turned out, that few were going to miss. Why ruin a perfectly good career on something so small time? Sooner or later the real killer, whoever he was, would slip up, cross their paths, and when they caught him, they would pin the lawyer on him then. In the meantime, they focused on the dwindling number of scumbags still littering Hell’s Kitchen, cleaned up the streets, made the city safe for people like his sisters and their kids.

They’d stayed clean since then, no funny business, no missing evidence or bodies, no stray bullets or questionable arrests. Surely, he thought as he stretched his neck from side to side, the powers that be would have forgiven them that matter by now. Bobby D was a relatively small fish in a much bigger pond…but collaring him might enable them to hook the bigger fish brass really wanted, and so they were staked here.

Simpson popped open his ever present pill bottle, swallowed two capsules, and offered the bottle to Torelli. “Only headache I have,” groused Torelli, “Is sitting here for four hours without a piss break.” He knew his partner suffered from migraines and that, whatever that prescription was, it allowed Simpson to function throughout the day. They also seemed to provide him with additional energy…although why he would need more in addition to the sugar rush and the Red Bull seemed insane.

Simpson shrugged and shoved the bottle back into his pocket. “Suit yourself. There’s a bottle in the back…”

“How many times…I’m not pissing in a bottle.” Torelli eyed the corner market. “Think you can hold down the fort for fifteen?” Not only could he use a piss, he needed something more substantial in his belly than coffee and the donuts Simpson was still devouring. A sandwich would be good. An apple. Anything but donuts.

After glancing at his watch and back at the apartment building door, Simpson nodded. “He hasn’t come out all day…I don’t expect him to now…not until its dark at least. Hell, he probably isn’t even there.”

“We should’ve just gone in and busted down his door,” Torelli muttered as he opened the car door. At least then they would have known if he was even around.

*

He didn’t call it sightseeing. Jack had driven around the city, from north to south, from the west to as far east as the sea would allow, weaving in and out of streets, stop and go traffic, skirting construction and accidents and congestion, without really seeing any of it. Oh he noticed the bridges, he caught glimpses of memorials and landmarks and architectural oddities, but he did so without really seeing, noting them in passing without taking the opportunity to admire what he saw. His cell phone had rang a few times, Chloe once, his daughter once, Carl once, but Jack did not answer either call, and if they went to voicemail, he did not listen to the messages. Familiar voices would be an anchor to the world, the life, that he was trying not to think about. Losing himself in the mechanics of driving largely unfamiliar streets felt to be a much more productive use of his time today.

The sights would be there tomorrow. The messages on his phone would likewise be there later. There was no reason in the world that he couldn’t wait to be there tomorrow as well.

In front of the Winston, he gave the valet the keys to his rental car and crossed to the opposite side of the street where a street vendor sold a variety of hot dogs and sausages from his little truck. Jack hadn’t eaten since the coffee and banana he had eaten at Chloe’s that morning but he wasn’t in the mood for hotel dining room food. That would mean dining in the company of strangers, and ordering room service meant dining alone. At least here, on the street, while he was technically alone, was not responding to the vendor’s attempts at conversation, at least Jack was surrounded by the undulating wave of passersby on their way home from work. He watched men and women enter the hotel in business suits, watched others come out in their evening finery for the abundant nightlife New York City was known for, watched those conference attendees who were not rooming here, with their name badges and occasional military insignia, squeeze through the door in clusters to share taxis or limousines back to wherever they were spending their nights.

The in and out swarm was a good enough reason for Jack to remain where he was. Soon enough the movement would dwindle and then he could enter and go back to his room without fussing with the press of people. He was in no mood for a night alone…but he was in even less of a mood for company. A shower…some television…a few drinks. That would be good enough before bed. After having been up all night the night before, Jack was more than ready to sleep now.

*

The phone call postponing dinner was both a disappointment and a relief. After a period of near dead sleep, Matt had awakened with on thought on his mind.

Talk to Torelli and Simpson.

And the closer darkness came, the more that distracting goal beckoned to him. Meet up with Frank, question the officers, learn anything he could about the identities of the men who had ‘killed’ him. Cutting the evening short would have been awkward, although his friends were well aware of the dual life he led, but skipping out on them felt to be wrong after having been so long away. Karen and Claire’s opportunity to see some sort of top-secret display was the perfect out, not only for Matt, but for Foggy, who apparently had some extra time to put into a case he was prepping for the next day. They would convene for dinner the following night…or maybe drinks if this side excursion did not take long.

It was good enough for Matt. He took the opportunity he was given and suited up, feeling less naked, less vulnerable, behind the mask than he did at any other time.

Something…a distant series of noises made him cock his head and listen. Something wasn’t right

*

The crack of automatic machine gun fire. Shouting, screaming, crying. Barked orders, bellowed commands until eventually, one final roar.

“No one move!”


	7. 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a smattering of NPCs...  
> apologies for the delay...this was a complicated one.

The demand could barely be heard over the cries of panic as those within the convention hall, as well as those in the Winston’s lobby screamed and tried to flee in panic. Nearly a dozen made it through the front door, stumbling in their race to escape the swarming shadow of individuals in black paramilitary gear and a variety of hotel employee uniforms who emptied from closets and work rooms, the kitchen, the gym, the pool room…anywhere that such people could have been hiding unnoticed for hours. Shots were fired in the direction of people fleeing out the front, but only the doorman was hit, blood quickly staining the shoulder of his uniform as he rolled backwards down the steps.

The metallic click of the door locks reverberated through the scattering cluster outside. Those inside who were incapable of stopping short before the assault of weapon’s fire, crashed into the thick glass of doors unable to open, and while some stood there, banging and begging to be let out, others collapsed to the floor with horrified, hysterical sobbing.

Officer Torelli had just stepped out of the convenience store, apple and bottle of water in hand, when the sound of gunfire rocketed through the street. His gaze shot first to the apartment complex he and Simpson were staking out, but it took less than a second, and the flurry of activity further down the block, for him to realize that the shots had come from within the Winston. Apple and water dropped into the lap of a homeless man slouched against a newspaper stand, gun drawn, Torelli running towards the people fleeing the hotel, shouting and waving to Simpson as he raced past the car to indicate where the trouble was coming from.

Simpson was already tumbling from the car, donut crumbs and Red Bull spilling upon the ground.

The terrified people in the street had brought the traffic to a standstill, as had the presence of another man running into the midst of the chaotic crowd, trying to reach the hotel door with gun drawn. Someone inside took a shot, maybe at him, maybe at the hostages; the specially treated glass absorbed the impact but the sound of it was enough to cause the blonde man to duck, hands shielding his head, his body blocking the fallen doorman who had yet to rise from the ground.

“Get back!” Torelli shouted, waving the onlookers and fleeing victims to one side while behind him, Simpson was calling in backup, both from other officers and any available medical services. At least one man was down, and if there was a gunman inside, there might be more injuries before the situation was resolved.

“CTU!” Jack yanked his badge from his pocket and flashed it, the gun in the other hand still aimed at the building though he knew a shot wouldn’t make it through the glass. While not on active duty, he had not yet given CTU notice, and still carried his badge and gun out of habit.

He was glad, at the moment, that he had it.

“What’s going on…?” Simpson looked Jack over skeptically but the badge looked legitimate and this was not the time for questions. He knew CTU by reputation, and it was possible that he and his partner had stumbled into some sort of government operation.

Jack began to speak, assuming the question was for him, but the doorman at their feet, his shoulder bleeding heavily, was attempting to stand and replied, “They came from everywhere…started shooting…waving machine guns about…”

“Who are they?”

“I don’t know. Some have gear…like SWAT…some just look like…cooks and housekeeping and janitorial…”

“How many?”

He shrugged. “They’re everywhere…there were screams in the dining room…the conference room…but I did not see. I don’t know…”

“Let me get eyes in there.” Jack already had his phone out, the gun temporarily holstered, and tried to reach the one person he was sure could hack into the hotel’s security feed to let them know what was going on inside.

*

“All units, be advised…”

Frank Castle had his own arsenal on hand before the police scanner fed him the details. He’d been preparing for his meeting with Murdock, preparing to confront another man he had thus far been unable to confront, and while he did not need such a distraction, the hostage taking of innocent civilians could not go unanswered.

Besides…Matt would be there. Murdock didn’t know it, but Frank had been keeping an eye on that place too since the day Matt had ‘died’. He even paid the rent to keep it vacant.

If Matt was there, and there were hostages in the building, he was going to need help with this one…whether he believed he would or not.

*

“John! John, do you hear me? John, answer me!”

But no reply came through Oliver’s earpiece, and he had to assume that his friend either could not hear him or was in no position to reply. Either one meant leaping to the Winston’s rooftop from the sniper position Oliver had taken on the adjoining building, but Oliver was not going to wait and leave John’s life at risk. There had been gunshots inside so long as he didn’t do anything stupid, John would be okay. He had to. Working together from inside and out, Oliver had to believe they could end this.

He made the leap, rolled, and came up on his feet…and stopped short, bow drawn.

*

Conference coordinators hustled the three panelists off the stage towards the side exit, where the lottery winners were crowded together. Rodrigo and his clipboard, his expression one of barely masked anxiety threw open the emergency exit door and said, just loudly enough for those gathered around him to hear, “Come on! Let’s go!”

It was a risk, but the only chance they had. Cassie grabbed Karen’s hand, as Hunter grabbed hers, and the three were herded through the door with the others. Karen was shouting Claire’s name, craning her head around to find her through the chaotic crowd, but as many in the room were still darting around in a vain effort to find an escape route while others had dropped to the floor with their arms and hands over their heads, screaming, crying, moaning in fear, Claire’s whereabouts were unknown.

John Diggle, though concerned for the others in the hotel, knew that he would be more help to them if he could get out of the building, reach Oliver, bring in the reinforcements to rescue the hostages. If he’d been armed, he could have gotten them clear on his own, but weapons had not been permitted in the conference room except by the organizers’ private security detail; John had this itching feeling he should have pushed Oliver for a slot on that detail himself. He allowed himself to be swept along by those around him, using his body to shield those nearest him when the echo of gunfire followed behind them, bullets imbedding in the wall near him, shards of drywall and plaster and wood spraying the retreating party.

Fortunately none of them, as far as John could tell, had been shot.

“This way!”

Someone at the front of the group shouted and the others followed like a horde of lemmings, having only one way to travel, down the dark narrow side corridor towards the illuminated exit sign at the end. There were two other doors on their left as they ran, John finding himself guarding the rear with a young red-haired woman who carried herself like a soldier and had pulled a can of mace from her handbag. Not much of a weapon, but it was more of one than John had at the moment and it might at least slow down anyone who tried to pursue them long enough for John to take them out.

*

Far below, from the place where the gunfire reverberated through the floorboards and walls of the hotel and into his belly, another sound came, a cry of Claire’s name, Karen’s fear as circumstances separated them. Fearing that something to be death, that the spray of bullets had claimed Claire’s life, Matt burst into the corridor, intent upon going down to end whatever madness had begun. But he could hear something else too now, a systematic emptying of the floors nearest the ground level, barked orders herding guests towards the stairwells at each end of each floor. As it seemed for the moment that Karen and others were being ushered to safety, and determined that the hostage takers would claim no more victims, Matt entered the nearest stairwell and leapt over the railing to the floor below, and again, until he stepped into the corridor three floors below his own. People milled about in fear, finding that the elevators were out of service and all well aware of the shouting and gunfire beneath them.

“This way! To the roof!”

Matt did not know where they would go once there, but there did not sound to be enough of the hostage takers, whoever they were, to pursue them. If Matt could catch them in the stairwell, he could stop the men with guns easily enough and maybe the policemen outside, a presence the sirens in the distance announced to be on their way, could get the other guests down to safety.

He could go no lower, the people in the rooms on those levels beneath him were already being cleared via the stairs at the other end of the hall, but he was able to get those above him to the safety of the roof. The last floor of guests was emptying when the gunmen finally burst into the stairwell directly behind and below Matt. The first was knocked off balance and unconscious by the well-aimed throw of Matt’s baton, his fall backwards through the door knocking down the man coming through behind him. There were two more men at the far end of the corridor, but that stairwell did not lead to the roof, so Matt only had to contend with the three before him for now. With the railing as a leverage point, he swung low, dodging a spray of automatic bullets that made those guests still in the stairwell above scream in fright.

“Keep going! Get to the roof!”

The shooter angled the butt of his rifle at Matt’s head. It struck, hard enough to cause Matt to stagger backwards…but never enough to stop him. His back hit the wall, producing a ricochet affect, and his fists flew, pummeling the gunman with both, enough force behind each blow to send the fellow reeling and rolling down the stairs. The second, having only been taken off balance by the fall of the first, barely avoided being knocked down by the third as well as he had now scrambled to his feet in order to follow the retreating Devil up the stairs. His handgun jammed, but Matt, near enough to grab his arm, caught it, smashed his wrist upon the metal rail, and let the gun clatter its way back down several steps. The man screamed at the breaking of his wrist, but the sound was cut off as Matt’s foot caught him in the chin with enough force to snap his head backwards, spin him around, and send him bouncing down the steps after his gun.

The other two paramilitary men were at the far end of the corridor, running towards them. Matt would have the guests to the roof by then. He would have them safe…but what of the rest of the hostages?

*

“Anyone made any demands? Do we know who they are? What they want?”

Chief Barnstrum had arrived with three other squad cars and a SWAT team in tow, and the four ambulances and two paramedic crews were hard at work checking those few who had escaped in the early rush of hostage taking for injuries or signs of trauma while officers did their best to take statements. There was no consensus on the number of shooters, their identities, or where they had come from…except that many wore SWAT like gear and that none of them had entered through the front door.

“And who the hell are you?” Barnstrum noted the badge now hanging visible from Jack’s pocket, but as Jack was an unfamiliar face, he would rather keep this shit show in the control of men he knew.

“CTU,” answered Torelli; the federal agent was still on the phone, trying to commandeer the SWAT team laptop for what the woman on the other end of the phone line was asking of him. The SWAT commander, however, was already trying to pull up visual images of his own and was disinclined to share.

“Feds…that’s just great…”

Jack ignored Barnstrum and looked at Torelli. “Find me a laptop.”

“No one orders my officers…”

“If we want eyes in there…”

“We’re trying to get a satellite feed,” the SWAT coms officer growled. “But the signal’s being jammed...”

That was all Torelli needed to hear. Surely one of the fleeing guests would have a briefcase, a laptop…hell even a tablet or large screen smartphone would do the trick. He dashed off to find one as Jack barked, “We need schematics of the hotel…the sewer lines or anything beneath it…the guest roster…anything to know how many hostages we’re talking about.” 

“We’re not busting in there until we…”

“There aren’t going to be any demands.”

“What in the hell are you…?” started Barnstrum, staring at Simpson as if he were an alien lifeform.

“We’ve tried to call in…no one’s answering. They’d have given us their demands already if they…”

The SWAT commander snorted as he bounced impatiently on his toes and watched between the coms’ officer’s work and the front door of the Winston. “You don’t take a whole hotel full of guests hostage without wanting something…”

“They’ll have to subdue them all and get the situation inside under control first before they start talking.” It’s what Jack would do if he was on that end of a hostage situation. “What…not yet, Chloe…wait…hold on…”

Torelli was returning and thrusting a laptop into Jack’s hands, its owner, a disgruntled gentleman in a business suit wanting proof that the police were really planning to use his computer and not steal or destroy it…and proof that he was going to get it back when it was over.

Phone tucked between his ear and his shoulder, Jack muttered, “Thanks,” to the fellow as he took the unit out, and set it up on the tail of the nearest car. “Yes…got it, Chloe…what do you want me to do?” Following the woman’s voice, the instructions she snapped out from her living room, soon there was a 3D rendering of the hotel visible on the screen with tiny images dotted about, mostly congregating now in the lobby and in one of the conference rooms, as well as…

“Up there!” Simpson shouted, as the SWAT coms officer barked, “Signatures exiting via the east fire exit…”

Barnstrum yelled, “Get a team back there now,” but his eyes were tracking the sudden congregating of bodies upon the roof..

*

“Into the bus…into the bus! Time’s wasting…”

“Shouldn’t we…?” It seemed foolish to Cassie for Rodrigo to be holding them to some viewing schedule that no longer seemed relevant in light of what was happening within the hotel.

One of the twenty-four countered with, “We should get the hell out of here,” while Karen shouted Claire’s name once again.

“Get on the bus.”

Rodrigo’s words were punctuated with the thumbing back of the hammers on a number of handguns as he and the now arriving debate coordinators held all twenty four, as well as the three panelists at gunpoint.

Hunter caught Cassie’s eye. They exchanged glances with the black gentleman on Cassie’s other side, the three of them assessing each other to be the most militarily experienced of the group, each assessing the situation the same. Whatever was going on inside was a diversion meant to get them away, but exactly what was wanted of this particular group of individuals, they did not know. With four guns upon them and no weapons of their own, the three could not overpower their captors, and without cooperation of the rest of the twenty four, they were going to be at their captors mercy for now.

Between the three of them, however, they just might find a way to get everyone out of this predicament alive.

*

“Shut up!”

Claire was amongst the first to drop to her knees, doing so prompted by the fall of an older woman who twisted her ankle as the chaos around them pushed her off balance. It felt to be no more than a sprain to Claire, but staying down kept both her and the other woman quiet and out of the immediate attention of the men with guns. She had heard Karen’s cry, had seen the small group being rushed through the exit door, and had to hope they were being taken to safety. So long as Karen was safe, Claire could get through this.

And odds were, unless Matt had gone out before darkness had fallen, he was still in the hotel. She could hear shouting and shooting elsewhere, the varying distances suggesting perhaps on the floor above them, but Matt would not be part of that. He would not be shot…not again. He would get her out of this.

She had to believe it to be true.

“Watches and jewelry…handbags and wallets in the bag!”

A robbery? It seemed peculiar, something like this in a hotel rather than a bank, but who were they to argue. Claire unclasped the necklace she wore, the one Karen had given her, and with a shaky hand, dropped it into the canvas shopping back a man in a front desk uniform brought around. He did not look frightened, so he was either not staff or he was somehow part of this assault. There was another beside him, one of those in soldier black, his automatic rifle at the ready for anyone who thought to cross them.

“My husband…” the woman beside her choked in a teary voice, clutching at the pearls at her throat in her wrinkled fist.

“In the bag! Now!”

The gun was pointed.

“He’d want you to live more than he’d care about the pearls,” Claire murmured sympathetically. “They can be replaced…”

“They’re all I have…”

“In the bag!”

Claire gingerly reached behind the woman’s neck and unclasped the string of pearls. “He wouldn’t want you to die for them.” Alive or dead, it was safe to say that any loving husband would value the woman’s life over the disposition of pearls, no matter what their monetary value. Holding the woman’s gaze, Claire gently encouraged her to let the pearls go and dropped them into the bag herself when the woman could not. Better the woman hate her for losing them later than to have her killed before her eyes.

The captors grunted and continued on their way.

Wherever you are, Matt, she thought, you better get here soon.

*

The man in red assessed the man in green, likewise assessed in return, but it was the man in green who nodded first, accepting the other as ally instead of enemy.

“Any more?”

“None I can get to.” Matt detected the edge of electronic manipulation of the other’s voice, and beneath it recognized a number of things simultaneously. A hint of cologne, a subtle shift in the other’s body that spoke of old injuries, the voice behind the modulator. “But we’ll have company soon…we need to get them to safety.”

“I can call in a…”

Matt cocked his head. The archer fell silent.

“They’re taking others…there’s a bus…” Karen was in that bus, but Claire…she was still below, her heartbeat fast but strong. Karen’s was growing faster and fainter, however, as the bus engine revved.

His pursuers were hammering against the door onto the roof.

“I’ve got wheels…I’ll stop the bus…you hold them here.” He took one shot, the arrow loosed from his bow embedding in the bus’s metal hull, then the bow was stowed for pursuit

“North. They’re going north.”

“I’ve got them.”

There was little other choice. Matt could not be in both places at once, and he could not hope to outrun the bus now pulling away from the hotel. A machine gun burst rang out from the building at the rear of the hotel, across the ally within easy distance of both Matt’s position and the bus. There were screams, shouts, squad cars burning around the corner to converge upon the bus’s position, but the shooter above them was already out of sight.

Someone below, one of the police officers, had spotted the huddled mass atop the roof and was barking orders for someone to get those people down, and the man in green had leapt over the side of the building and was scurrying down the fire escape and so Matt turned and braced himself for what was about to burst onto the rooftop. He would protect the innocent with him…and then he would find a way to help those inside…and god help that sniper when Matt got his hands on him.

Oliver Queen would do the rest.

*

Rodrigo yanked the steering wheel with one hand to keep the bus from smashing into the corner of the building as the driver, his head split by a sniper’s bullet, tumbled out of the driver seat. Having no choice, Rodrigo managed to leap over the fallen man into the seat and the bus lurched forward, very few precious seconds lost in the exchange. Police vehicles entered the alley behind them; the other end was barricaded with chain link fencing and a dented dumpster.

“Brace yourself!” Hunter shouted, moments before the bus slammed into the dumpster, forcing it to rip through the fencing and slam to one side of the alley. Path cleared, the bus bumped over the debris left behind, turned a narrow corner into another alley, and dove headlong into the blocked traffic of the street. Cars were thrown this way and that, the chaos of them slowing the police pursuers off the trail long enough for the bus to make its escape, with only a motorcycle in pursuit.

*

The helicopter’s spotlight traced a path across the Winston’s rooftop, a police chopper arriving to offer light and backup to the officers below, the light locking onto and illuminating the cluster of people who had moved as far away from the roof access hatch as they could get. It moved into that position moments after Oliver left the roof, moments after armed assailants shot through the access hatch barricade to find themselves embroiled in combat with the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen. One tried to take aim at the helicopter as another shouted something into his com device, but a well-aimed shot from the sniper on the nearby rooftop caused the bullets to spray in a wide ineffectual arc.

The copter’s spotlight pinpointed the newest shooter on the rooftop of the building at the rear of the hotel. The crash of the bus into the alley fence and the blasts of flashing red and blue light drew focus away from the sniper and into the alley but Barnstrum’s command over the radio brought both the light and the helicopter back to the Winston’s roof. With the helicopter’s attacker now without a weapon, and the sniper, it seemed, on their side, the pilot brought his bird lower to cram as many stranded people inside as possible.

They ignored the Devil and his fight.

In the street at the front of the hotel, reports were coming in from the rear of the hotel, of a sniper on the roof, a bus loaded with people racing away, of the host of wreckages now littering the street south of the hotel, of the return of the Daredevil. Barnstrum’s face grew redder with each report, the veins at his temple bulging and throbbing with each bit of news.

Torelli exchanged a look with his partner. Daredevil had been gone for nearly a year. Most had believed him dead. This had to be a copycat for sure…but was this a good thing or a bad thing?

Still on the phone with Chloe, speaker phone now on so that he and Chloe could interface more efficiently with the SWAT Commander, Jack scowled to hear the radio chatter. What had started as seemingly straightforward hostage situation was quickly devolving into something more chaotic.

The SWAT commander’s phone, the one used unsuccessfully to call the kidnappers before, blatted out its first ring of the evening; Barnstrum grabbed it before anyone else could, not caring if it might be SWAT business.

“What the hell do you want?” he barked, eluding the SWAT commander’s attempts to grab the phone. His face turned from red to purple before the receiver in his hand went dead.

“Get that helo down from there!” he commanded.

Jack side-eyed him but continued listening to what Chloe was telling them. Having that helicopter land on the roof before knowing what the kidnappers wanted might have been a stupid idea, but maybe the chief had saved a few lives, hopefully not at the expense of any of those inside.

*

“What the hell, Frank!” The man clad in black, his gun slung over his back, was met with the frightened cries of the rooftop hostages. It had taken him long enough, even at a full run, to join Matt here that by the time he did, the two Matt had been fighting had been knocked unconscious, their weapons kicked away from their easy reach. That was not good enough for Frank, however, he yanked a battered spool of strong black tape from one of the pockets on his vest and quickly wrapped it around the two men’s wrists and ankles. Maybe he could not kill them now, but he was going to make damn sure they wouldn’t hurt anyone else.

“I didn’t kill anyone…you can thank me later.” He hadn’t killed anyone on the roof, that was, had merely shattered the gunman’s hand so that he dropped the rifle, sparing the helicopter pilot long enough for six of those stranded upon the roof were able to scramble to safety before it lifted off in response to ground control’s order. It wouldn’t be returning. The rest of these people, for now, would have to remain where they were.

The bus driver was another matter, one Frank did not regret in the least.

Frank tossed the empty spool of tape aside and got to his feet. “There’s people down there…”

“Stay here; protect these…”

“Like hell, Red. They’re safe here. No one’s coming…you need me. Those inside need me. I’m not babysitting.” Frank slid the two men’s weapons in the direction of the hotel guests so that they could choose to protect themselves if necessary, and pushed open the roof access door. “You coming or not?”

Matt growled, and for a moment thought to argue. Giving the frightened people those weapons was asking for them to kill the two captured men, but he had to trust that they would not feel that killing the bound, disabled figures to be necessary. 

Frank did have a point. The people here were as safe as they could be for now. There were no more enemies coming to the roof as they were all busy encircling the two collections of hostages below, six in the lobby, seven in the conference room, with another twelve roaming the hotel in groups of three. Only the calls over the downed men’s’ radios, met by bursts of static rather than spoken replies, would eventually bring others to seek them out. Matt could go after them alone with his determination to disallow any to get by him, or he could wait here until the guests were rescued…

…or he and Frank could work together to weed out the militants below and save the hostages. Both men’s talents would be put to much better use doing that then waiting here for help to arrive, and if what Frank had said before was true, any officers finding him on the roof were likely to shoot him on sight as the murderer they were seeking in Matt Murdock’s death.

“No killing, Frank…we do this my way…”

“Sure, Red…whatever you say.”

Matt was not convinced for one moment, as he went back into the stairwell, that Frank meant what he said.

*

“I can get in here,” Jack finally decided, pointing to a service door at the kitchen that was far enough to the lobby to make quick work of infiltration.

“You’re not going in there alone…”

“I’ll go.” Heads turned towards Simpson, who was shoveling a bottle into his pocket as he spoke. “I know the Winston…I worked there as a boy…I don’t need a map to get around…”

“Where he goes, I go,” grunted Torelli. Simpson was his partner. He wasn’t letting him go into this shit storm without backup.

At first he was going to protest. If anyone should go in with Jack, SWAT would be the wiser choice. But the Commander already had his own agenda, his own plan, an intent to go in through another set of service doors near the swimming pool. There were a few roving men with guns, and the locked doors had now readied the alarm system; any efforts to break in would trigger the alarm and alert the captors of their entry, putting the hostages at risk. But Chloe assured them she could hack the alarm system and the door locks long enough for teams to get inside, and with SWAT com monitoring the movement of the men within, the teams could get in at the safest moments without confrontation. Jack preferred to work alone, but having someone who knew their way around, having the extra firepower, was probably the smartest thing to do.

They could breech the lobby together, rescue those hostages, and hopefully make it to the conference room before…

“What about them…?”

Torrelli pointed to two blips now descending the stairs from the top of the building. With eyes no longer upon the roof, Jack pulled on the bulletproof vest the SWAT team offered him and grunted. “Let’s hope they’re on our side.”

He also hoped that it wasn’t some pair of fools determined to play hero and get themselves killed.

“Let’s go.”

Unable to do anything else useful as his two officers also donned vests and followed the federal agents, waiting for more demands that never came and some report that the bus had been spotted and stopped, shouted, “Where the hell’s that shooter?” to anyone who was listening. Maybe his team could at least get that much right tonight.

*

The arrow’s beacon tip was the only thing that allowed Oliver to track the bus’s progress as it sped through stoplights, busy intersections, and construction zones somewhere ahead of his position. He took side streets, those safer and with less traffic to impede his progress, until he finally caught sight of the dented dark blue bus traveling against traffic a block parallel to his position. Oliver dipped through the next alley, his bike tipped so that his leather clad knee nearly scraped against the pavement. It brought him directly behind the bus as it approached the tunnel ahead, with the intent of pulling alongside it, forcing it into the tunnel wall, anything that might stop it without injuring the passengers he was unable to see through the black tinted windows. Using knees and one hand to steer the bike, Oliver used the bike, he yanked a heavy steel knife from its holder and threw it.  
The rear door of the bus flew open and the man there opened fire.

The hit home, imbedding in one of the back tires as the front of the bus crossed into the artificial lighting of tunnel. It, bumped as it dropped its left rear corner and continued to drag as the driver raced along, metal dragging upon pavement sending up a shower of sparks into Oliver’s face. The impact of the corner threw the gunman out of the bus with a yell and a reflexive pulling the trigger added bullets to the spray of fiery sparks, all ricocheting off the pavement, the walls, the curved roof of the tunnel.

With one arm shielding his eyes against the sparks, although it provided no protection from the bullets, Oliver veered left…into the path of an oncoming sports car. He overcompensated in the turn back as the rear of the bus whiplashed to one side. The driver of the car, hand smashed to the blaring horn, tried to avoid being smashed by the unwieldy bus. A bullet pierced the windshield and struck below his collarbone. Hands off the wheel now, the driver screamed. Control lost, the car spun, smashed against the cement tunnel’s wall, and slid directly the path of Oliver’s bike, now spurting gasoline from several punctures in its tiny fuel tank. Bike and car collided, their momentum and the constraints of the tunnel bring them to an eventual tangled stop. The smoke of small gas fires began to fill the tunnel. Oliver was thrown clear, the driver of the sports car, caught safely in the embrace of his airbag, was trying to peel away in fear of the flames licking at his engine, and the bus continued to drag away, disappearing behind the smoke that allowed Oliver to limp away, the bike abandoned.

It wouldn’t do for those behind the wailing sirens in the distance to find the Green Arrow here, now. He had to get safely away. He had to get another vehicle if he was going to find that bus before he lost it altogether.

*

Cassie pulled those nearest her down the safety of the seats when the rear door of the bus bust open. John reflexively stood, body blocking the passage between the seats, facing the back of the bus, near enough to the door that he hoped he could push at least one of their captors out, reduce the number they would have to fight later. What he saw through the open door momentarily gave him a surge of hope.

Oliver.

But the hope was quickly dashed with the chaos that followed, the eruption of bullets and sparks, of collision and smoke that swallowed Oliver’s wreckage behind them. Something struck him in the back of the head with enough force to bring darkness.

Hunter shook his head at Cassie. This was not the time. There was already a chance they were going to die on the limping, shuddering dragging bus. They would have to stop before the sparks set the bus on fire. That, he hoped, would be their best shot at escape…but not if they were both unconscious like John Diggle.

*

On the SWAT commander’s signal, with the all-clear given by Chloe, Jack and his team entered their designated point as the SWAT team did the same. Weapons ready, both units began their coordinated sweeps towards the lobby. Jack took point, Simpson on his left flank, Torelli on his right. Once inside the hotel, however, their com pieces failed, some form of interference there strong enough to scramble that signal even if it had not kept those outside from seeing in.

Or so it had seemed. Jack’s squad had barely made it into the kitchen, the door closed behind them, when the first set of three black clad gunmen emerged from a hall immediately to their left…where no one should have been according to the all-clear signal. One shot went off before Torelli jumped the shooter and Jack and Simpson took out the other two. Unfortunately, it announced their arrival, their presence here, and Jack knew it wasn’t going to be long before they were set upon by more.

He grabbed one of the rifles and Torelli and Simpson did likewise. They were going to need that firepower soon enough.

Maybe they would be enough of a distraction to give the SWAT team the chance to make the rescue unimpeded.

*

The new echoes of gunfire where there had been none before brought those guarding their hostages to attention, and brought fearful cries from the hostages. Those in the conference room, more vigilante now, did not leave their posts, however, following orders given through the tiny buds in their ear to remain where they were. In the lobby, however, the militants herded their captives into a tighter mass while those units not already directed to seek out the uncommunicative team members on the upper floors were sent towards the kitchen and dining room to find the cause of the commotion there and to take care of it in any way necessary.

*

“Company.”

They were one floor above ground level, having raced down the stairs unimpeded, Matt making sure on each floor that there were no hostiles to dispatch, none that could either make it to the roof or sneak up behind them. There were two teams here, however, six men, three protecting the opposite stairwell, three sweeping from room to room in search of their compatriots who were not answering their coms. With no darkness to cover them, Matt and Frank waited beyond the door to the stairs, a surprise ambush the best defense against the guns the others carried.

“No shit,” Frank muttered. He didn’t need Matt’s sensitive hearing to know the voices were closer, just beyond the door.

But those were not the men Matt was referring to. Beneath their feet, others moved, men from the outside, men equipped for the work they were about to undertake. It was the gunfire elsewhere, a familiar sound that boiled through Frank’s blood with a familiar heat, that explained Matt’s one word comment…just as the door in front of them opened.

Matt’s powerful fist felled the first while Frank grabbed the second and yanked him into the stairwell. The third, in pursuit, charged through the door only to be caught as Frank slammed it hard upon him. He shouted his surprise and pain as Matt pulled the one from Frank’s grip and delivered another series of blows to incapacitate him as well, while Frank slammed the door three more times up the third fellow.

It might not kill him, but the man was going to be in traction for months.

From the far end of the hall, shots were fired, rapid bursts that splintered the door propped open by the moaning body upon the floor. Frank stood to one side of the door, Matt to the other, as the shooters came closer, continuing to shoot at the door to hit whoever was behind it. Matt and Frank were out of the line of fire, but not for much longer. The element of surprise was gone.

Baton at the ready, Matt made his move. When the inevitable lull in gunfire came, magazines spent, Frank pulled free so as not to be trapped behind the door when Matt threw it open. The baton bounced off of one wall, caught one man in the head, then another. Frank’s own gunfire joined it, catching one man in the leg and another in the shoulder so that he dropped his now loaded gun. Both stepped over fallen bodies, using fists and feet to render each unconscious so that they could pass without fear of being stopped.

“They’ll wake up, you know…”

“The police will have them by then.” Matt was confident of that. He knew where Claire was, he knew how to get to her, while the others in the building, police he presumed, seemed concentrated on the lobby. It was a logical play, for clearing the lobby would make it easier for other officers to get into the building, but such a move might prompt those in the conference room to start killing hostages.

Matt wanted to get to those people before that happened.

*

The gunfire on the floor above them was a cause for concern, as Jack had no way of knowing who was shooting at who, but he had concerns of his own, when another trio of militants clattered into the dining room, knocking tables and chairs aside in their haste to reach the kitchen. With Torelli covering him from the swinging kitchen door, Jack darted for the bar, shooting in the direction of those shooting at him. One cried out, caught in the throat by Torelli’s clean shot and Simpson, seeing his opportunity, charged fully into the room, heedless of the risk he was taking as he headed straight for the dining hall door, though which the clustered hostages could be seen.

“Goddamn it!” Jack shouted, taking his own shot at the first of the militants to turn to shoot at Simpson. The man dropped like a wet sack. In the lobby, many of those guarding the hostages peeled away to engage the man bellowing towards them like an enraged bull.

Torelli followed Jack, wondering what in God’s name had possessed his partner to do such a reckless and stupid thing.

“Stand down!”

“Guns down!”

The first shout came from the one militant who seemed to be the one in charge, the second simultaneous one from the SWAT team leader who was entering the lobby from the opposite side. The few who chose not to comply were met with bullets, non-fatal shots meant to incapacitate so that the captives could be brought in for questioning and justice.

The one fatal shot among them was made over the heads of the prostrated hostages, a perfectly executed headshot that felled the militant leader where he stood at the head of the room.

“Simps…” started Torelli.

“He was going for his gun!”

Indeed, the way the man lay now, as most of the SWAT team gathered around, his gun dropped from his holster, his hand not far from it, it appeared to be true.

But it wasn’t what Jack or Torelli had seen.

“This way!”

The lobby might be secure but Jack’s job wasn’t done yet.

The commotion in the kitchen and the lobby provided Matt and Frank with enough distraction to make it into the conference room, crashing in through a side door, Frank and his rifle making short order of four of the militants while Matt, blow by blow against those three who tried to stop him, herded the hostages towards the door where safety would be found. The fight was quick, unexpected as it was, and with the chaotic swarm of hostages trying to push through the narrow doorway, it gave both Matt and Frank the chance to slip back out again, this time into the corridor where the lottery hostages had been taken to the bus. By the time Jack and Torelli and the two SWAT team members got into the room, all they found was bloody, unconscious men.

“Sweep each floor…get those people off the roof,” Jack barked. They needed a headcount of the enemy, a headcount of the rescued, a headcount of the wound. “Make sure it’s clear…” Barnstrum, he believed, would charge in the moment he thought the hotel was clear, whether a clear signal was given or not. Jack wanted to be as far ahead of that brash decision as he could be.

“Gonna do the same,” muttered Frank, cocking his gun. “See where that bus might have gone. That was too damn easy. Doesn’t smell right.”

The sound caught the blonde man’s attention, tearing it away from his lone inspection of the fallen bodies in the conference room. By the time he reached where the sound had come from, however, pushing the door into the exit corridor, he saw no one, only the movement of the door beneath the exit sign. Thinking that one of their perps might be escaping, Jack eased down the corridor, gun in hand, ready for anything.

Anything except a man in a horned mask.

“Hands where I can see them…who are you?”

“There was a bus here…this was all a distraction…”

“Hands up,” Jack repeated, circling him with the intent of blocking his escape. He knew the bus had been here, knew it was gone now, but like everyone else, he did not know the connection between bus and hotel events.

“Okay…” Matt raised his hands. “There were hostages on that bus…twenty three…I need to find them…” From the alley shadows nearby, he heard the hammering of a handgun. No, Frank, he thought. This guy was just doing his job. Killing him was going to send the law after Matt as well as Frank; they didn’t need that, not when their night’s work was yet to be finished.

“You’re not going anywhere.” A man in a uniform…of any sort…in the middle of this mess…was going to be brought in for questioning. Guilty or not, he had information, and Jack didn’t trust a man who’s face he could not see. “Turn around…and walk.”

Matt frowned as he turned. “We’re wasting time…”

“You’re wasting mine. Walk.”

Regretting what he was being forced to do, Matt steeled himself, bracing muscles to spin, to kick, to knock the man out long enough to get away. Before he could do so, however, he heard a sound, a loud OOMPH, and turned in time to see the man falling towards the ground, hitting with enough force to put him out cold. Or maybe he was unconscious before he hit the ground. Matt could smell and taste the copper tang of it in air, but as he knelt to check the man’s pulse, Frank charged from the shadows, grabbed his arm, and said, “We gotta go, Red.”

With other officers now in the hall where Matt and the stranger had just been, Matt relented.

At least the downed fellow still had a heartbeat. Matt would have to have it out with Frank later. He needed to find that bus, needed to find Karen. He needed to find Oliver Queen.


	8. 8

Ducked down behind the backs of bus seats, it was impossible to tell what direction their crippled bus was limping or how far it had travelled before it dragged to a stop. Hunter tried to count street lights, hoping that would help, but when they passed more than a dozen that were unlit, through several turns down even darker streets, he eventually gave up. He didn’t know this city. He didn’t know where they were, where they might be going, or how his efforts might eventually help them. Cassie had her hands full with the man knocked unconscious by their captors, who did eventually come around to waking shortly before the bus clattered over three speed bumps and stopped.

“Out. Now.”

Hunter nodded at Karen who, emboldened now that she had regained her composure and realized she had a handful of strong people on her side, encouraged others to their feet, offering her strength to steer them from the bus under the watchful eyes of men with guns. She had forgotten, in her initial fear and worry for Claire, that the three panelists had been brought onto the bus. Two of them, from their behavior and that of their captors, were not in the same danger the rest of the passengers faced. The third, however, while perhaps not in mortal danger, was being bullied by the others, his head of gray hair bowed, his eyes downcast.

“Doctor Alvarez…”

He looked up at her with a spark of recognition, but it was quickly snuffed out with a shake of his head that discouraged her from saying more. If he could not afford to acknowledge her identity, then it was for reasons that would put them both in danger. But, as Karen was already helping others, she banked on the chance that her sliding her arm around him, beneath his arms to help him limp from the bus, would not look suspicious.

“We’ll get out of this,” she whispered, her head bowed to hide the movement of her lips and the hissing sound of her words. “I know people…”

Alvarez only shook his head no. “Not where we’re going…”

So he knew where they were going. That would have been a relief if he too had not seemed afraid.

Behind them, it took both Hunter and Cassie to get Diggle off the bus, and though their captors urged them to hurry, it seemed that they were not prone to leave the barely conscious man, or to harming him further. Appearing more groggy than he was, having already assessed where the other hostages were being gathered at the rear of the bus, John muttered, “There…lean me there,” with an apparent weak bobbing of his head towards the quarter-panel above the still intact tire. There were long scratches and gouges along the panel, where crashing past the dumpster, the broken fence, and numerous damaged cars had all left their mark.

What John wanted was still there, however, and with his back slumped against the panel, he was able to pry it loose without anyone noticing and shove it into his pocket

Both saw it as they propped John into position there. Cassie nodded to Hunter’s questioning look. An arrow head might be no more than a weapon, but with their bags, phones, and wallets confiscated now, it was the only weapon they had, save for their own bodies. But Diggle finding the opportunity to use it was a long shot.

Only John knew the truth. It was a weapon, yes, but it was so much more. He would only use it as a weapon as a last resort. So long as he had it, they had hope. Oliver had followed them before, thanks to this. John had to hope that the arrow tip was undamaged enough to allow Oliver to follow them still.

With her head bowed towards Alvarez, seemingly both in fear and to offer comfort, Karen’s gaze darted side to side in an effort to identify their location. They were in a warehouse, open on one side towards the water that was east of them now rather than west; having passed through the tunnel she judged them to no longer be in New York. New Jersey? They had not traveled far enough before entering the tunnel to have crossed the East River, so New Jersey it had to be. But who would ever think to look for her, for them, here? Wherever here was. Across the water she could make out the lights of what she thought could be the piers, the ships berthed there along the river side of Hell’s Kitchen. It confirmed that they might not have traveled as far as the time allotted should have allowed. But the bus was hindered, moving to slow; they couldn’t drag the damaged transport through the streets for long. It would invitie some police officers to pull them over, to ask unwanted questions. She guessed their captors did not want a shootout, did not want to attract any more attention than they had. But there was nothing here that lent itself to a being an adequate hideout, no boats, no cars within view and nothing within the warehouse save for metal steps leading to catwalks above them and drag marks and tire tracks that suggested whatever had been here before had been taken recently. Nothing but a long stretch of undeveloped land she guessed, or once developed land that looked to be being prepped for building again.

She’d heard about some big construction project on the Jersey shore…but where? What was it?

A long van, black with windows only to the front, unmarked and unassuming, pulled into the warehouse and parked beside them flinging its rear doors opened as if they were arms reaching in greeting. No one needed Rodrigo’s command to know what they were meant to do. Karen saw the look that passed between the large black man and the wiry man who had spoken to her before the kidnapping, a look that suggested they had a plan…or at least the start of one.

God, she hoped they did…or that Claire had gotten safely away and had been able to find Matt. This wasn’t Matt’s territory…but surely he would come of her. Surely he wouldn’t hold the fact that she had moved on, found love elsewhere, against her.

*

“Claire!”

Uninjured, she had waved off the care of the attending EMT staff in favor of helping them. Claire would have nightmares about this night for weeks to come, but if she sat around and did nothing, she would only fret about Karen. It was better to keep hands and mind busy and keep her ears open for any details the swarming law enforcement officers might let slip.

Foggy’s unexpected voice in the midst of the chaos came as a welcomed bit of relief.

“Are you okay? Where’s Karen? Don’t tell me you were in this mess…”

“I’m fine, I’m fine…” She finished bandaging a man’s scraped arm and handed him a bottle of water the hotel staff had donated, and then pushed her hair back away from her face. “I was there…but it’s over now…” For most of us. “Karen…some of them were taken out the back or the convention room…she was with them…”

“Where is…?”

“I don’t know, Foggy…no one does. Someone said there was a bus…she might have been on it, but it’s gone now…” But from what she had overheard, the bus had driven away in the heat of gunfire, leading the police on a quickly aborted chase thanks to the destruction the bus left in its wake. Somehow the bus had been lost in the Jersey Tunnel, miraculously not trapped inside after a collision between a motorcycle and a sports car, as it had passed unnoticed into New Jersey, creating a headache of paperwork and departmental maneuvering as the two states worked out some way of finding this bus together.

For reasons Claire did not understand, it seemed that the Jersey cops were none too keen to play nice.

“Was Matt…?”

Voice low, she nodded. “He was here…he and Frank…”

“Castle? Was here?” Foggy was not sure whether that was good news or bad news. He had not seen that man’s particular brand of crazy since the night Frank had spirited Matt’s suit away before the cops could come and find the Daredevil shot dead in Central Park. Despite having witnessed his friend’s death, Foggy wasn’t entirely sure that Frank Castle hadn’t had a hand in it. Only the fact that the Punisher had laid low after that, gone into hiding, either retiring or being much more cautious and selective with his kills, had enabled Foggy to put the man out of his mind.

He did not think it was a coincidence that Frank Castle had resurfaced at the same time Matt had.

“They were working together from what I…”

“He doesn’t remember anything of the last year, but he remembers Castle…? You don’t think he’s…you know…?” He dragged his hand across his throat as if cutting it, and Claire stared at him.

“Frank or…?”

“Matt!”

She shook her head adamantly as she grabbed a blanket and wrapped it around the shoulders of the woman the police escorted her way. “Of course not! He’s still Matt, Foggy. Whatever he’s lost…whatever he is now…he’s still Matt. He wouldn’t do that…”

“I hope you’re right, Claire…” Sounding unconvinced, Foggy looked around at the swarm of freed hostages and law enforcement. There was nothing he could do here, but maybe there was someone out there he could pump for information. Someone he knew. Finding a familiar face, he waved his hand above the heads of those around him and shouted, “Davis! Hold up!”

He was a lawyer. There had to be something lawyerly he could do that didn’t involve fretting about Matt Murdock, Frank Castle, and the seemingly missing Karen Page.

*

“Where are we, Frank?”

Matt had followed Frank across several rooftops and several streets until they had pushed into this dingy building, climbing an unlit stairwell up three flights into a corridor with rotting floors and paint and plaster peeling from the walls. It smelled of decay and the squatters that had undoubtedly called it home until Frank had moved in. Only the yellow taped with its ‘condemned’ warning printed across it in bold black letters and the fearful respect the residents of lower floors had for Frank kept this level now undisturbed and entirely vacant for his use alone. The building’s primary redeeming quality was the raucous bar on the ground floor that, due to its nineteen hour a day, seven day a week schedule, masked the constant chatter of the police scanner Matt heard long before Frank unlocked and unbolted the door behind which he slept…when he could sleep at all. The spacious apartment, with the walls knocked out between rooms, smelled little better than the corridor, the worst of it masked by the variety of oils and metals that came with guns and ammunition and an overpowering smell of stale coffee. There was also the underlying intimate scents that were Frank Castle, details Matt locked in on but that few others would notice without longstanding familiarity with him.

Once more Matt wondered how well he had known Frank before ‘death’ had robbed him of his memories.

He also wondered in passing how long that bar would stay in business with the rest of the building falling down around it. Like so many others in the Hell’s Kitchen he remembered, the residents were tenacious; the bar would stay until someone forcibly evicted them.

This was the Hell’s Kitchen he knew, not the polished, bright, almost upscale quarter the majority of it seemed to have become. The contrast would have been jarring if it was not also hauntingly welcome. Matt felt more at home standing in Frank’s rundown apartment then he had anywhere else in this city.

Frank dropped his guns upon the long table in the center of the room, a table strewn with other military paraphernalia, pulled out a stool with his foot, and pushed it in Matt’s direction.

“Make yourself at home, Red…don’t have much in the way of furniture…” He shrugged and pulled over the only other stool in the room. Both were old metal, with padded faux leather tops that were cracked and worn and had seen long use at someone else’s hands. “Never have guests.”

“I’m honored,” Matt said, his tone expressing both amusement and gratitude for the respect he was being shown. Most might have assumed they could invite him in without fear of his either finding the place again or noticing the less than perfect details, but Frank knew Matt’s capabilities better than that…and Matt knew it. Bringing Matt into his lair took a high degree of trust; whatever their differences in morality were, they had clearly respected and trusted one another before…and Frank was offering it to him again.

There was a toilet with questionable plumbing and a kitchen sink with old, rusty pipes, but at least it allowed for running water, although only sponge baths were possible as the shower fixtures had been stolen or broken long ago. The struggling hum of an ancient refrigerator churned in a distant corner, beside a flimsy countertop of propped up plywood and broken bricks, upon which rested a microwave and a hotplate with the coffee pot Matt expected to find. The extension cord that ran all three, and that fed another line to the police scanner, one lamp, and an impressive array of tools, hung through the broken out corner of the kitchen window and ran down, duct taped to the side of the building, to an apartment at the rear of the bar. An old lumpy mattress buried beneath a cluster of blankets lay in the corner that was the farthest from the windows, a corner that would give Frank a clear shot at windows or doors where someone might try to enter when he slept. Blankets covered the windows, fluttering in the warm night breeze, making the room stuffy and uncomfortable, but Frank made no effort to open them. Doing so would let in the fresher air, but it would also expose him, and Frank was not the sort to be comfortable with exposure.

A click and hum announced the turning on of the bright desktop lamp, the only source of lighting available most of the time, and then Frank hunched over the scanner, turning the dials as he searched for any scrap of news that might alert them to the bus’s current location.

“You think we can find them that way?”

“Maybe. Beats knocking heads until we find a scrap.” Only complete incompetence, or an intentional failure in traffic cams, street cops, and the helicopters which were combing the city for it now, could have kept that bus completely off of the grid, or. Someone had to have seen something.

“You need a hand unit…” Owning even this much was questionably legal, but there were similar rigs that private citizens got hold of, using them to gawk, to chase accidents and news stories for profit or kicks, so Matt could not judge Frank for having it. No one else had the advantage of his hearing. To do what he did, what they both did, they needed information, and with Karen’s life on the line, getting that information in any way possible mattered.

“Had one…it got busted.” He looked up long enough to see Matt at the window and grunted. “Fire escape to the roof is safe enough, if you want to have a listen…”

It was a tempting offer. Down at street level, there was more interference, the echoes of daily life too close and jumbled to allow for the picking out of details that needed to follow his own path to justice. Even here there was too much interference. But Matt was also keen to learn how Frank did it, relearn details that he thought he must have known once long ago. Besides, there was something else…

“Ol…there was a man with bow…he was following the bus…”

Frank was staring at him. He could feel it. “Queen was there?”

“You know him.” It surprised Matt more than it should have, as well as proved that he had identified the archer correctly.

“We’ve crossed a few times,” was all that Frank muttered. It didn’t sound like Frank got on with the other man, or maybe their methods didn’t mesh, but tonight, at least, they were on the same side, and Matt was willing to set differences aside in order to find Karen.

“Maybe we can find him…” He paused, head cocking towards the corridor. “Someone’s…” Matt had paid little attention to the shuffling steps that had staggered their way up the stairs or had then weaved back and forth in the hall outside the door. The individual was making no efforts to disguise their approach, and from the sound of their breathing and the smell of them, the individual did not present a threat. But his approach proved no mistake when the footsteps stopped outside of Frank’s door, when the shaky hand clutched the knob too tight, and by the time he dared open the creaky door, Frank already had a rifle aimed at the thin, dirty, disheveled man’s head.

“Hey…hey…hey…no…easy, man…saw your light…thought you’d want to know…”

Frank growled and lowered the gun. “Not tonight, Rodney.” The meth-head, paranoid as he was, had proven a valuable source of intel in the past, able to point Frank to dealers, gun runners, mobster types that Frank felt it his duty to exterminate whenever they crossed his path or he crossed theirs. But Frank was seeking a bigger catch tonight, and he had little spare time with which to feed any of the man’s multitude of bad habits.

“Something big at the tunnel…Jerry scooted back from there talking of gunfire and explosions and that guy you asked me to tab…the one with the green hood…”

Frank’s growl turned to a scowl and he looked into the apartment shadows where Matt had gone, keeping out of the Rodney’s sight. Good call, that, Frank thought. Last thing he needed was for Rodney to connect those two particular dots and go off spouting about the Devil. The only reason he kept his mouth shut about Frank was because Frank fed his habits and beat up those who tormented him…and he was a low enough man in the scheme of things that he kept clear of the law. Most who knew of his meth habit considered everything he said to be paranoid ramblings not worth acknowledging. But one wrong word, one slip, and that could change. Frank was not going to put Matt in the position of having to trust a stranger.

“Jersey Tunnel?”

Rodney’s head bobbed. “Only one.”

It wasn’t much, but it was a start. Taking the tunnel meant crossing state lines, which explained why the NYPD channels weren’t feeding him anything useful. If the Arrow had been there, it was worth looking into.

“Line me up a car…and get gone.” The handful of bills he carried were fed into the other man’s hand as Frank geared up again. Rodney knew the drill. By the time Frank reached the street, someone’s car, likely belonging to a too drunk bar patron who shouldn’t be driving anyhow, would be running for him. Rodney would watch for him until he reached the car, then he’d scoot to reward himself with whatever his collection of money could buy him.

“Round the corner, half a block south, Red, alley next to the donut shop…” Frank said into the shadows as Rodney closed the door and went downstairs with more haste than he had come up. “We’ve got some hunting to do.”

“Half a block.” Matt did not waste time nodding before grabbing the long black coat hanging from a nail upon the wall and taking the barely secured fire escape to the ground far below. He understood what Frank was suggesting, and why. He couldn’t exactly climb into a car on the street in view of the well-lit bar. And he couldn’t make it on foot across the Hudson, into unfamiliar territory, as the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen. On the ground, the helmet came off, and as carefully as he could, he made it to the rendezvous point moments before Frank and the stolen car did.

The chase was delayed only long enough for Frank to duck inside and buy enough strong coffee to fill his thermos. No wonder the man rarely slept.

This hunt was going to require different tactics…ones Matt was going to have to make up as he went along. Either that, or he was going to have to trust Frank to take the lead on this one. As much as it rubbed him wrong to give up the control, at the moment, he saw no other choice.

*

“He’s really back?”

“He’s back?”

Torelli wasn’t sure who sounded more surprised, or perturbed, by the revelation Jack Bauer shared as the woman stitched up the cut on the back of his head. Jack’s description of a perp in red and black, with tiny nubby horns upon his helmet, eyes red behind the masking that hid his face, could only be one man. Simpson had heard about it before, but did not sound now like he had believed the news then…and Barnstrum certainly didn’t now.

“He did this?”

Torelli’s interest in staving off the debate that would likely erupt over the controversial figure, was derailed by the woman doing the stitching. He recognized her from inside the hotel, and, he believed from the hospital from some past business there, but he couldn’t recall her name, if he had ever known it. If he had a type at all, she would be it.

She didn’t sound like she believed her own question.

“Someone behind me,” Jack muttered sourly. He had been waiting for someone to cross-reference the guest registry and conference attendees Chloe had provided him with all of the names the police had collected of those hostages they had freed. There would be those who hadn’t been in the hotel, guests out to dinner, out on the town, out on business, and there was all of the staff now accounted for. It was taking too long to compare names, and that delay, along with being fussed over, was making Jack irritable. It didn’t help that he’d been jumped by an obvious accomplice of the man in red and black, who had in turn escaped him.

“Should have known they’d be in on this,” Barnstrum was fuming. To the officer nearest him he barked, “Put a bolo on both Punisher and Daredevil! Bring me their heads!”

Daredevil? Jack scrubbed his eyes. Well shit. Why hadn’t he thought of that? He should have known. Now peeved that his failure to identify that man had wasted time for both of them both in delaying the Devil’s pursuit and resulting in Jack’s being unconscious for the few minutes between Torelli finding him and getting him to this ambulance. Now resources were going to be split unnecessarily, and Jack knew damn well, by the chief’s tone that the man wasn’t going to listen to reason if Jack tried to deter him from pursuit of Daredevil.

“Where’s that list?” Jack shouted. At least if he had names, he might have a place to start. People had been taken; he needed to know who if he was to figure out why…and where they might have been taken.

“Here, sir…” Someone shoved the handwritten page into his hand; it was sloppy, written hastily, but still legible.

“I need to get these uploaded…cross referenced…” There were some forty names on that list, and he had already been informed that the list of ‘lottery winners’ had been twenty five. So twenty five, plus the three panelists that hostages had reported taken as well. Who the rest of these forty were needed to be determined, guests or staff or…”

“I know these ones…they were the panelists…and this one, he lives in the top suite…”

Jack began to shift his gaze at the nurse who had just finished cleaning the blood from his head, not making note of the last name she pointed to, when another name caught his eye.

Cassandra Bruce.

“Shit.” That time the word was muttered out loud. He hadn’t known she would be here; how could he have known? And how in hell did he call her family and ask if she was home…safe…without alerting them to the dire situation at hand? Without alerting them that he was here…that he was involved? Without dragging her father into this mess, the last man Jack had any desire to butt heads with right now?

Fortunately, Cassie was well trained for situations like this. If there was a way out from the inside, if she really was among the taken, Jack had to trust she’d be strong enough to stay alive, if not get free.

“Sir, we’ve got reports of a bus matching the description of ours at the center of that tunnel crash…”

“I’m on it…” Jack hopped up off the edge of the ambulance.

“You’re not a cop…” protested Barnstrum

“That’s exactly why I’m…”

“I’ll go.”

Barnstrum wheeled around on Simpson, finger shoved into the man’s chest. “You’re not going anywhere! IA is already riding my ass about what you did in there…”

“He was going for his gun…” That Simpson did not ask why IA would be on him revealed that he already knew what he was being called for.

“Not according to the eye witnesses…”

“What witnesses…?”

Torelli interjected, “I’ll go.” There were already officers on scene at the crash, but none who knew what they were looking for here, and if that was the same bus, if there was the possibility of fatalities connected to tonight’s events, he wanted someone from their precinct on hand to note it. If Simpson was being kept out of the loop, Torelli could go and keep him in it. Besides, he’d already established a bit of a working relationship with Bauer; why not have them both go, satisfy Barnstrum that the feds weren’t messing up his case, making everyone happy at the same time.

“Get out of here,” the chief growled with a wave of his hand, the words and gesture offhanded as he snapped at Simpson, “That’s IA’s business; you’ll have this out with them and stay off the street until they say so, you hear me? Badge and gun…now.”

As much as Torelli wanted to support his partner, this wasn’t the time for it. He had a duty to the hostages; they were not going to rescue themselves. Trying to fight for Simpson here and now would probably result in Barnstrum sending someone else, maybe suspending Torelli too, and that wouldn’t do anyone any good. Besides, he knew what he had seen in there…and what he hadn’t…and those details where he was the fuzziest weren’t going to help Simpson out. If he stayed away, stayed busy, made himself instrumental in the kidnapping case, it might keep him out of IAB’s crosshairs long enough for Simpson’s situation to be resolved without him.

Snatching the businessman’s laptop over the man’s retreating protests and the reassurance of other officers that they would see it returned to him, Jack grunted, “You’re driving,” as he followed Torelli to the squad car. Torelli knew the area, knew the streets, knew the people. Right now, Jack only knew that he had to make sure Cassie Bruce was safe…or it wouldn’t matter what Carl Bruce said to him. If anything happened to Cassie, Tamara was not going to welcome Jack back either. And Jack wouldn’t blame her one little bit.

*

Oliver was relieved that the hour was growing late and that Ruth was likely in bed already; with any luck, she was asleep. He did not need to go up into the suite of three penthouses that occupied the top two floors of the building; he only needed to get into the garage, take one of the other motorcycles housed there, and head back into the night. The tracker in his watch, synced to the beacon he had sunk into the bus when it first fled the Winston’s alley, was still beeping sporadically, indicating that although it was apparently damaged, it was functioning enough for Oliver to track it. It would be so much easier to do from a computer, with someone like Felicity directing his movements across the city, but Oliver and John had learned to make do since her death, make do without dragging Ruth into their nightly escapades, and tonight would be no different.

“Ollie?”

He grimaced at the gentle voice that came over the intercom. Apparently not asleep, else she would not have noticed the building security system announcing the arrival home of someone with a proper ID badge.

“Is that you, Ollie?”

It had to be, unless someone had stolen or hacked his ID chip. He detected the worry in her voice, and pressed the com button on his watch. “It is, Ruth…go back to bed.”

“Where’s John?”

“He’s…”

“Is he with you? You were at that hotel, weren’t you? The one with the hostages? He’s okay, isn’t he…”

“Of course he is, Ruth…he’s helping the hostages. I came back for a bike…going right back to…”

“Keep him safe, Ollie…you hear me?”

She was reading between the lines. She had to be. Hearing what Oliver wasn’t saying. Or maybe there had been some report on the news, a development Oliver was not aware of. Maybe they’d pulled his bike from the tunnel and she’d seen footage of that on the news. Had some camera caught John’s face on that bus?

He hoped not.

He could not ask Ruth to tell him what she knew, however. That would raise doubts in her mind about Oliver being on top of the situation. She was a strong woman, but he did not think her strong enough to worry needlessly about John.

Oliver was trusting that John was safe, that John knew Oliver was coming for him. Whatever was happening at the hotel would have to wait. He’d left that matter in Daredevil’s hands. He trusted that man to be safe too.

“We’ll be home as soon as we can be,” Oliver promised. If she spoke again, the revving of the bike engine drown it out. She would hear it empty onto the street within moments…and she would have to trust him then.

*

A chaotic collection of emergency vehicles blocked the road, disallowing them from approaching the accident site, but after a few moments out of the car, Frank returned with an array of grumbling curses under his breath; maybe he thought Matt would not hear them. Maybe he did not care. Matt had heard enough chatter amongst the cops on duty, the ambulance staff to know what Frank had learned. A sports car, a motorcycle, both sporting a collection of bullet holes that indicated there had been a third vehicle involved…the vehicle housing the shooter…but only a single victim was present at the collision scene. There was discussion of whether the motorcycle rider had been thrown clear, had been taken by the shooter, or had managed to stumble away from the accident. There were orders barked to sweep the river, to search the businesses and structures near the head of the tunnel, and to check every step of the tunnel into New Jersey, every hospital within radius. Find that victim.

The car driver was alive but unresponsive, his life spared by the airbag but shock, blood loss, and a head injury leaving him unable to answer questions for the time being.

Frank’s contact had put Oliver here. Matt had to believe that the man was alive, that he had made it clear of the accident to avoid the questions his attire would undoubtedly raise. As long as he was unharmed, he would be looking for that bus. But with no way to reach out to him, they could not rely on the Arrow’s help tonight.

As Matt continued to listen, Frank backed the car out of the area of congested traffic, unable to go forward as he wanted, and after a series of turns gunned the engine.

It took only the first few shouts, the blaring of horns and tight swerves left and right for Matt to realize that Frank was driving against the flow of traffic, through the other leg of the tunnel.

“Frank…” he hissed. He was afraid of little, but in this moment, his life was entirely in Frank Castle’s hands, and the man’s insanity seemed likely to get them both, and other drivers, killed.

“You want to get after that bus…?”

“Not like this…”

“Any other way is going to take too long, Red. Delays are going to work against us.” He looked down at the hand tightly closed around his wrist and growled. “Unless you want to drive…let go.”

Matt inhaled, held the breath as long as he could, and released it in a long slow hiss, his hand coming away with it. Frank was right. There had been a time where he’d gotten an exhilarated thrill from driving like this…when Elektra had been behind the wheel.

He must be getting old. Older…though not necessarily wiser.

They made it out of the tunnel without incident or accident, without leaving a trail of automotive carnage, to be greeted by the sound of sirens in the distance. Sirens coming for them, most likely. “Hold on,” Frank grunted. Through alleys, through a carpark, around several corners in every cardinal direction they sped, until the sirens were too distant to be in pursuit and they were able to cruise along the late night streets at a normal, casual pace.

“We’re gonna need to ditch the car…”

Matt was inclined to agree. “I need to go up.” Up was going to be the only way to hear, to hopefully pinpoint the bus’s direction, if not its location. Out of his element here, unfamiliar streets, he was not sure even that would work, but unless Frank had hidden a police scanner on him, or had one stashed in a Jersey safe house, they couldn’t rely on that. They could spend all night bashing heads without finding a thing. Finding a secure rooftop was the best option they had.

Frank drove for several more blocks, scoping the buildings around them, until he found one he thought would suffice. “On the right, Red…tallest I can get you on short notice. Do what you do…I’ll do what I do…”

“And what is that, Frank?” He hesitated asking, envisioning innocent blood spilled all over the streets of New Jersey.

“Don’t worry.” There was no need for killing anyone right now. Ditch the car somewhere it was likely to be stripped for parts within minutes so there were no worries about fingerprints or DNA evidence, scout out a new one if needed, put his ear, and handgun, to the street trash to search in his own way. They weren’t so far from the tunnels, for all of their detours, and he felt confident that someone in the area, street kids, street trash, hookers and the homeless, had to have seen something. Between the two of them, he and Matt just might find what they were looking for before it was too late.

Though Matt scowled, he took Frank at his word and, after ditching the jacket where he hoped he might be able to find it later, quickly scaled the building Frank had indicated, the tallest in the immediate vicinity which would allow for better listening. He chose not to listen to Frank’s movements as the man drove away, chose not to think about what exactly Frank intended to do. Frank had said no one would be killed.

As he perched upon a corner of the roof, crouched as he listened to the night, to the late night television broadcasts, the fights, the whispers of lovers, the ebb and flow of sparse traffic and the crisscrossing wails of sirens, he listened for anything of use…anything that would tell him where he was, anything that would tell of the renegade bus, anything that would reveal where Karen Page had been taken.

*

By the time Torelli and Jack picked their way through the tunnel chaos, the ambulance’s departure for a nearby hospital clearing a swath for them to pass, a clearer picture of what had happened within that tunnel had begun to emerge and, with the wreckage cleared from one lane, traffic was waiting anxiously to creep through the tunnel again. A shooter on a bus had taken shots at both the motorcycle and the car. At least, those in the vehicles behind the horrific traffic incident reported it that way. The motorcycle’s rider, wearing dark clothing, possibly black, possibly blue, possibly green, and no helmet, had been trying to pass the bus when the rear door opened and someone in military gear began shooting. A couple reported that the motorcyclist had shot back with a bow, but none of the others did, and since there was no evidence of such a thing at the scene, only bullet casings and the rounds embedded in both bike and car, those reports weren’t taken seriously.

They reported how the driver of the car had lost control of the vehicle when the bullets hit his windshield, how it had side swiped the bike, how the fires had begun. Witnesses seemed to agree that the bus had continued on through the tunnel, but it was not there now, and where it had gone on the Jersey side no one seemed to know.

Jack’s federal badge got them clearance to cross the state line, but now that they had reached the deserted streets where traffic normally came through the tunnel, there was nothing to see except two squad cars parked across the road to stop anyone who came through…to stop a bus if it emerged, which of course, now it was not going to do.

“That you Torelli?”

“Mortie…good to see ya.” Torelli leaned through his open window to clasp the Jersey officer by the wrist. “How’s the wife and kids?”

“If I got to see them more, maybe I could tell ya.” The man’s heavily accented voice and his thick build marked him as being of the same Italian stock as Torelli, though he was slightly older with a touch of silver now streaking his temples and forehead.

“Yeah, I was sorry to hear about that. What she did to ya was shit…”

Mortie shrugged. “Can’t really blame her, ya know…bein’ married to a cop ain’t easy…especially one who normally works homicide…”

“Yeah, I was wondering what the hell you were doing here on guard duty…”

“Spread thin tonight. Some asshole burned through the eastbound tunnel coming west…got people chasin’ him…and a fire at the refinery sucked up a bunch more guys, and patrols are out looking for your runaway bus…” He snorted and rolled his eyes.

“If its already…then what are you doin’ here?”

“Some ham-hand up the chain thought it would be a good idea to stop folks from coming through until its cleared on your end. That why you here? Looking for the bus?”

“Part of a hostage situation…some of the perps got free and took hostages with them. Description sounds like it fits the one at the hostage scene. Anything you can tell us? Anything you know?”

Mortie’s partner, a waifish blonde who barely looked old enough to shave, leaned low from where he sat in the car, fiddling with the radio, to poke his head out so that Torelli and Jack could see him.

In a deceptively deep voice, the blonde said, “Been some reports of a bus with a flat raising sparks and a ruckus as it dragged through…they’re being investigated now…but nothing that…”

“You got addresses for those calls?” asked Jack, bringing up a map on the laptop.

Mortie and his partner Deirson looked from Jack to Torelli; Torelli wore the uniform, Jack did not. Rather than have the man flash his badge, Torelli said, “Feds,” as if that explained everything. Knowing little about the hostage situation that had resulted in this runaway bus, the Jersey officers accepted Jack’s presence more readily then Barnstrum had and between them and the two officers in the other squad car, six addresses were rattled off and marked upon the map.

“Looks like they were moving north…not straying far from the water.” Torelli turned the screen so that he could see it better. “I know this area…we could make a drive through…see what we might find?”

It was the only lead they had right now, the best one they were likely to get until something official came through, so Jack nodded. “Let’s take a look…”

Deirson frowned. “We’re not supposed to let…”

“Kid,” barked Mortie, “either back the car around and let ‘em through, or get out and let me drive. You don’t hinder a federal agent without a damn good reason…” He winked at Torelli. He wasn’t allowing them through for Jack, he was doing it for Torelli.

Jack didn’t care what sort of history the men shared so long as it got them through the blockade and, he hoped, closer to Cassie.

*

The tracker in the arrowhead had been stationary for several minutes as Oliver raced through the streets. With the tunnel still blocked, he had to swing all the way south to the Holland tunnel, and then backtrack along the emptier than usual Jersey streets in the northerly direction the signal pulled him. Traffic would pick up again in another hour or so as the cities on both sides of the river came to life and began their early commutes, so Oliver knew he had to move quickly if he was to reach wherever John and the others had been taken before sunrise. The light traffic meant that he could travel faster than usual but as he hunkered lower over the bike to keep the silhouette streamlined, he worried that it might not be fast enough…

Especially when the signal died.

He gunned the engine and opened her up for more speed.

*

“No one’s here…”

“No one?” Frank’s disappointment was heavy in his voice. He’d found an empty delivery van parked in a loading bay, its keys in the ignition, its motor running, and he’d commandeered it without hesitation. Those he had talked to, willing to give words for money, to avoid a bullet in their head, our out of respect for the skull painted across Frank’s body armor, a symbol they understood even if they’d never encountered him before, had pointed him towards the waterfront, and by the time he arrived there, he found Matt already lurking in the shadows atop the warehouse nearest where Frank entered the night-abandoned construction zone. Lights off on the delivery truck, thinking now that his choice of vehicles was particularly fortuitous as it would not look suspicious here at all. He had scanned the area for any suspicious activities, but had not seen even a vagrant as he approached, and other than a small pack of stray dogs zigzagging along the water’s edge with their noses to the ground, he saw no one.

He’d hoped they were all inside one of the handful of metal warehouses or the pair of mobile office trailers located at one end of the fenced off area, but he trusted Matt’s perceptions. There wasn’t even a trace of security guards and the gate through which Frank had entered had been unlocked, opened with the chain hanging loose to clatter against the chain-link whenever a gust of wind caught it. Whatever was here, no one felt it worth protecting, making it unlikely that their bus had come here.

“You sure this is the place then?”

“I heard…” Matt frowned. There had been the sound of metal scraping pavement, voices, barked commands, and then another vehicle had come and taken the voices away. None of those voices had been Karen’s but two he had heard…he knew them. One of the fellow’s on Coulson’s team. Not a hostage taker, but a hostage himself, along with Oliver’s friend Diggle. That explained Oliver’s double interest in pursuing the bus himself…although maybe he had not known his friend was there.

“This is the place. The bus is inside…empty…”

Frank grunted. “Then let’s go have a look…”

“Wait…” He caught Frank’s arm and Frank growled at him…the sound cut short as moments later the throaty purr of an expensive racing bike came close enough for him to hear it too. Matt crouched at the edge of the roof, waiting as the bike passed through the gate, approaching their location, and with his specially crafted billy club to anchor him, leapt from the roof to land directly in the bike’s path, his body crouched and ready for combat.

Although in the moment it took to leap and land, he had already identified who the new arrival was.

“What are you doing here?”

Matt straightened, and with a flick of his wrist, retracted the cable and snapped his club back together. “Same thing you are, I believe…”

“Looking for that…” Frank had taken the long way down, though with enough speed and dexterity that he reached Matt’s side as the motorcycle’s engine was cut and the Green Arrow had dismounted.

“Castle…”

Yep, Matt acknowledged to himself. There were definitely issues between Frank and Oliver.

“Queen.”

Matt, glad he was standing between them, interjected, “No one’s here…but we should get out of sight just in case. Shall we take a look?”

Oliver grunted and started through the open double doors into the warehouse. “The hostages?” he muttered under his breath. He had missed out on Frank’s involvement, did not know why Frank was even here, and as he preferred speaking to Matt anyhow, it was easiest to direct his questions there.

“Situation’s in hand,” Matt assured him. “None of the hostages dead…some minor injuries…they’re okay.”

“How’d you end up here?”

“Followed your trail,” Frank offered snidely.

“And we listened,” Matt quickly added with a touch of mirth, an attempt to lighten the mood. “Thought you’d be here first…” Even with the crash, Oliver had been given enough of a head start to have reached the scene long ago.

Oliver shrugged. “Delays,” was all he said. There had been the need for a new bike, Ruth, the extended detour south to find an accessible path across the water, and then, when the signal had gone dark, he had spent several minutes trying to recalibrate his comm device in the hopes of getting it working again. The effort had failed, and so he came to the last known location of the beacon. None of that, however, Matt needed to know.

They split their search, Oliver examining the exterior of the bus, the place where the beacon had been embedded in its side, the trace of those who had been brought out and then reloaded into a different vehicle. Frank took the perimeter, the warehouse, in the search for any clues as to why the kidnappers had stopped here. Chance, perhaps, this being the first available haven for the bus to stop that would get it out of sight of the police and allow for a secretive transference of hostages. But something in his gut, some remnant of his military training, whispered that this was no coincidental stopping point. He was willing to bet his best gun that the lack of security guards, the open gates, even this open warehouse, had all been prearranged as a transfer point, somewhere they kidnappers could ditch the bus that law enforcement was looking for and move their prisoners in something else no one would think to take note of. A van…a delivery truck…a boat…

He trudged out towards the river’s edge, but there was no trace of footprints in the compacted earth, at least not enough footprints to have been created by thirty or more individuals being taken to a boat.

So a van or truck it was then. He turned back, his boot hitting something solid and sending it skittering across the ground. He squatted and picked up an old worn horseshoe. Frowning, he dusted it off and tucked on prong of it through the waistband of his pants. Horseshoes were good luck. He might as well keep it. If nothing else, it would make a good weapon, or could be melted down for munitions later. Right now they needed all the good luck they could get.

God knew they were going to need it.

Matt, meanwhile, climbed into bus, his gloves protecting every surface from any prints he might leave. Traces of perfume and cologne lingered in the air, as well as hints of terror and the coppery undertaste of blood. Not enough blood to suggest a fatal wound, but someone had been injured. He found an earring, a discarded business card that read Essex, with a man’s name, telephone and fax number, and an email address upon it. It was worth investigating, as it might give a clue about one of the hostages, or even one of the hostage takers.

There was nothing to tell him about Karen, however, no clue save the barest hint of her scent lingering upon the plastic of the seat where she had been. With nothing here suggesting death or even serious injury, he told himself that she was alive, that they all were alive, and that somehow he would find them.

“It’s not here,” Oliver muttered, his fingers tracing the punctured metal where the arrowhead beacon had previously been. It could not have fallen off sooner, as these were the last coordinates the beacon had given him. If it had fallen off after the bus had parked, it should have been upon the ground, or at least fragments of it should have been if it had been stepped on by heavy boots. The other options were that John himself had taken it, the removal of it from the point of impact somehow jarring the transponder so that it no longer transmitted, or that the kidnappers had found it.

If they had the technological equipment to identify it as a transmitter, they wouldn’t be able to trace it back to him, but they would not need to. They would also be able to destroy it…or reprogram it to lead him into a trap. He scowled and wondered what he would do should that beacon re-engage. Truthfully, however, he expected it to have been damaged or destroyed by now. He was going to have to find John and the others the old fashioned way…even though he did not know what that was.

Frank stalked across the empty expanse to see what Oliver was looking at. “What’s not here?”

“Well someone is…” murmured Matt, standing shoulder to shoulder with Oliver. “Police.” He could hear the radio as it neared the open gate, and though he hoped the car would continue past, it seemed the officers were concerned about the breach enough to pull through and proceed into the pass where Frank had parked. Two men exited the car, with the click of a flashlight marking their inspection of the truck’s interior.

Maybe whomever Frank had stolen it from had reported it missing and it was what the cops were looking for. Maybe, having found it, parked and abandoned with the keys still in it, they would feel no need to investigate the vicinity in search of the thief.

Frank’s quick turn towards the sound of the truck door closing, however, dislodged the horseshoe from where he had tucked it and the clatter it made upon the cement floor of the warehouse rang loudly enough to announce their presence.

Oliver glared at Frank. Frank put his foot over the horseshoe to cover it, gun already aimed at the open warehouse door. Oliver’s bow as likewise aimed, as neither of them knew yet that the men they were about to confront were law officers.

Neither Torelli nor Jack Bauer had any inkling of what they might find within the warehouse. Their triangulation of witness sightings for the damaged bus had brought them to this stretch of undeveloped riverside property. There were several buildings within the perimeter of the fence, and several on the streets outside of it, that might have made a suitable parking space for a bus. It was only the open gate, and the delivery van parked with the driver’s door open that prompted the pair to pull in here. The crash within might have been nothing, but it warranted a look, and so the two men, their own guns drawn.

“Drop the weapons!” Three voices spoke in unison, Jack, Torelli, and Frank.

Matt admitted, as he stepped into the space between both groups, that he was surprised that Frank had already taken a shot. He recognized the voices, the blonde from the alley behind the hotel, and Torelli…one of the two men he and Frank intended to speak to. He hoped, while raising his hands and saying, “No one needs to shoot anyone,” that Frank recognized it too and decided that a gunfight was not in anyone’s interest here.

“You…” Hearing that Daredevil lived was one thing. Standing face to face with the man that he, like so many, had believed to be dead was another. And not only Daredevil…but the rarely seen one called Arrow…and the one known only as Punisher. Behind them, the bus in question, dented, battered, looking as if it had been dragged through hell to get here. It was emptied, abandoned, and he wagered, devoid of clues.

“Where’s your partner?” he spat.

Torelli, assuming he meant Simpson and wondering why that would concern the Punisher, answered only “Busy…the way you have been…”

“We didn’t contaminate your crime scene,” Oliver said, his voice now filtered and modulated to be unrecognizable. Matt wondered if either Jack or Torelli would know Oliver if they saw him. The bow had been lowered, the string relaxed, but Frank, though he had lowered his arm, was far from relaxed.

“I’ll be the judge of that.” Jack holstered his pistol and held out his hand for whatever Matt was holding in his hand.

There was no reluctance in handing what he’d found. An earring told him nothing, and the business card…well, they likely had better resources to check into the cards owner than Matt or Frank had. “I don’t know if one of the hostages left it or not…maybe you could…”

“I’ll run it against the hotel registry and the convention guest list,” Jack said. He didn’t think it worth asking how they had come to be here. Now that he could put the moniker ‘Daredevil’ to the red fellow, identifying the others was easy enough, the result of having comic fans in the House. Someone in the area must be cloning their own superhero posse. In a city as big as New York, such clones might go unnoticed indefinitely. He wondered how many more might be out there, how many more he might find.

“What do you three know about what happened?”

“Nothing,” Frank grunted to Torelli’s question. He was lucky Frank had said that much.

“I know the convention held a lottery,” Oliver offered, without intending to tell them how he knew that. “The winners were to be given private advance access to something…”

Jack tucked the card into his wallet, less concerned about any prints that might be on it then he was for what the text itself might reveal. The company name Essex rang a bell, but he was unsure why that was. All he needed was a few minutes to put Chloe on it and they’d probably have all the answers they needed. “What sort of something?”

“I don’t know. Something top secret. The convention dealt with medical advances on both the military and civilian front…new medicines, advances in patient care, new treatments for cancers and other life threatening conditions, research developments into psychological disorders and addiction treatments…military combat care…it could have been anything. I’m sure those on the bus were the lottery winners.”

Torelli nodded gratefully to Oliver for the answer, which was considerably more than Frank had given them. “Think we need to look into this lottery?”

“Who was conducting it…who was selected. Anything at all. We get some names and I’ll have my contacts run them.” Normally Jack would send something like this straight back to CTU so that the whole team could work on it. This time, as he was not technically on duty, he chose to keep it between he and Chloe. There wasn’t anything he might need that she couldn’t get for him, and with the three men before him on his side, he didn’t doubt they’d have the kidnappers in custody and the hostages safe within a matter of hours.

“If we’re going to be working together on this…” Jack withdrew a slip of paper from his wallet, an old receipt of some sort that was now faded beyond readability, and after gesturing for the pen in Torelli’s pocket, wrote down his first name and his cell number upon it. “Call me…if you get anything at all…”

“How do we know we can trust you?” growled Frank, the gun now aimed at Jack though there seemed no immediate intent to shoot him. He’d been screwed over by the government before, by a fellow soldier, an officer, who had ripped everything away from him and tried to destroy his life…not to mention the law enforcement people who had tried to help by setting up a shoot on sight order for crimes he had not committed. Frank had few reasons to trust anyone. Of the men around him, the only one he trusted was Murdock.

Thus when Matt said, “We can trust him,” Frank stood down. He still didn’t quiet grasp how Matt knew things, knew when someone was being truthful or when they were lying, but he’d learned long ago that Matt was always correct.

Jack nodded at Matt. “Probably easier for you to get hold of me then the other way around…” Men in masks didn’t carry calling cards or give out the phone numbers of their daytime personas. It did not matter that Jack knew who those daytime personas was. They did not know that he knew, and it seemed wiser to keep it that way for the time being.

But Oliver took the pen as it was being offered back to Torelli, tore the receipt in half, and wrote another number on the blank half. He had wanted a contact inside law enforcement for some time but had never found one he could trust. If Murdock thought he could trust these men, which he seemed inclined to do, then Oliver would too.

“Don’t give this to anyone else.” He looked from one to the other. “It comes directly to me…and I’ll get anything you pass on to them.”

Jack tucked the number away with care as if it was a sacred thing. Torelli frowned, but as there wasn’t anything else to write it on, and he didn’t have a cell phone handy to put the number in, getting the number would have to wait.

Simpson would kill for a prize such as that. Hell, anyone on the force would. Too bad he’d never be able to tell them he had it. Well…maybe his partner. He trusted that man with his life after all. Surely he could trust him with this.

“Gotta call this in…you three should get lost…gonna be knee-deep in cop shit before long,” Torelli remarked over his shoulder as he drew his radio from his pocket.

Frank eyed the radio but shrugged his shoulders after Matt gave him a disapproving glance. As much as he wanted one, he wasn’t going to steal it from their new ally.

“We’ll be in touch.” Jack returned to the squad car and the laptop to get his newest data into Chloe’s hands. Torelli, on the radio summoning backup, was walking the perimeter of the warehouse much as Frank had done earlier, making sure the warehouse was secure. In the distance, traffic was starting to pick up, though the sky was still dark, and the three men looked at one another expectantly.

Or two of them looked when they reached the Arrow’s bike, and one waited.

“Can’t parade you through town like that...” Oliver said to Matt. “Someone’s going to recognize you…we won’t all three fit…and it’s probably best you leave the van.” He grinned at Frank’s scowl. “Tell you what…you two find somewhere to lay low for awhile and I’ll get us transport home.”

“You’re gonna scoot through morning traffic like Robin Hood?” Frank challenged.

“Nope.” Oliver patted the seat of his bike. “Got me a change right here…just have to find somewhere open to get us transportation.”

Matt smiled. “Smart.” He didn’t have such an advantage, but normally it didn’t matter. Normally he was not caught away from home as the sun rose.

Frank, though not keen on trekking across town to the waking eyes of the city with an arsenal strapped to his body, could at least remove the telltale vest he wore. “Saw a fleabag motel a few blocks back…we can get there and get a room…if you’ve got any money on ya, Red.” All the money he’d had was either given to Rodney or used to buy coffee. “I’m skint.”

“Does it look like he carries cash?” Oliver laughed. He opened the bike seat, fished in his wallet, and pulled out a couple hundred dollar bills. He gave the money, and his phone, to Matt. “Get a room…get a shower…I’ll call when I’m on my way…find out where you’re at…I’ll bring you some clothes…then we’ll sort all this out over breakfast at my place.”

The Winston would still be swarming with cops for many more hours; getting into Matt’s place would be impossible. And Oliver didn’t even want to imagine what sort of rat infested hovel Castle called home. A good hot meal ought to give them time to put their heads together…and might even give Torelli and the fed a chance to pull up something useful from either the bus or the business card Matt had found. They had no time to waste, but a meal and a little rest would do them all a world of good.

“Wait…my horse shoe…” Frank turned around to retrieve it.

“Anybody ever tell you its bad luck to start somewhere and go back?” chuckled Matt, continue on through the dark, seeking the shadows in which he could hide.

“Also bad luck to fuck with me,” Frank said once he’d rejoined Matt at a run, the horse shoe this time tucked more securely into place. “That doesn’t seem to stop anyone.”

Matt laughed again, the sound weary and burdened with his worries, but still sincere. “No,” he agreed, “it doesn’t.”

The Arrow’s motorcycle sped past them but neither watched him go. If he had already changed his clothes, neither of them noticed.


	9. 9

The hostage passengers were unloaded from the bus in some sort of underground parking area. The bus had entered a tunnel, and John had assumed they were crossing back into New York. But the tunnel had gone on too long for that, a tunnel lit by harsh fluorescents, blocked at periodic intervals with barricades, gates, armed guards, several layers of security designed to protect their eventual destination. He judged they were too far below ground for most of the journey, further discouragement to anyone who curiously wandered into the tunnel, or who thought to take shelter here from the ravages of nature. At some point, the downslope reversed, and though he guessed they were still below ground, John knew they were much nearer the surface than they had been in several miles.

When the doors of the parked van opened, everyone within blinked, blinded by lighting that, while still dim, was considerably brighter than the near darkness they had been riding in. None of them were cuffed or bound, and if not for the obvious presence of firearms which kept anyone from foolish notions of escape, their arrival and exit from the van seemed no more than a group reaching their fieldtrip destination. Looking back past the last computerized entry point they had passed, down the darker tunnel, John was sure it was the nature of that tunnel that had also kept those in the van from attempts at escape. It was doubtful they could have crossed each checkpoint and lived, or at least crossed without capture.

He fingered the arrowpoint within his pocket, his hands stuffed there as casually as he could stand, and wondered if the thing had begun to transmit yet. If it would even be able to transmit through what he wagered were some highly shielded walls.

Since he no longer needed assistance to stand or walk, Cassie had joined Karen in assisting Doctor Alvarez out of the van. His legs were shaky as though he was too weak, but no one had seen him injured. Maybe fear had weakened him.

If that was the case, then what lay ahead might be the worst of what they had faced so far.

“Welcome to Iaso,” Rodrigo began.

“Iaso Global?” asked Hunter with a scowl. Of the gathered groups, some appeared to recognize the name. Others did not. Those who had, from Cassie’s vantage point, looked to be medical researchers in their own right, or, in Karen’s case, someone who had made it their business to know such things. Those who did not know the name, fewer in number, seemed to be doctors, lower ranking military personnel like herself, or John Diggle…whatever he was.

Rodrigo smiled disarmingly as one of their ‘guides’ from the bus began handing out sealed plastic packets stuffed with a variety of documents, and another followed with a clipboard and pen. “You’ve heard of us then. Good. Iaso is home to the world’s leading genetic modification researchers…”

“Cloning?” asked Cassie as she accepted the packet. She knew a lot about cloning from the practical standpoint, having lived amongst a large family of clones for many years. And though her parents and aunt did not know it, Cassie had been studying for years the science behind cloning, wanting to understand how it worked, why it worked…

…how to do it herself.

She thought she had heard of every cloning facility, every manufacturer of equipment and every agency that worked in developing the process, refining it, making it possible. But Iaso was not one of them, meaning that this was either a military agency or else cloning was but a small part of what they did.

“Some of our work includes cloning, yes,” Rodrigo replied. As mass cloning was no longer a public secret, sharing that detail was hardly giving away top-secret information. “But Iaso is so much more, as you shall soon see. As soon as everyone has signed the non-disclosure clause…”

“I’m not signing anything,” Hunter muttered.

Unruffled, Rodrigo continued, “Everything you will see within this facility is classified, Mr. Hunter. You select few are being welcomed to a tour of the work being done here, as it is Iaso’s intent to become a household name, build a reputation for excellence as we endeavor to improve the lives, the health, of all of mankind. You are all free to decline to sign, but those who do not be able to accompany the rest of the tour…”

Some signed the forms right away. It was standard procedure, after all, at such facilities, and most of those in the group knew their companies and organizations had similar policies for any outsiders who wished to enter, to see the work being done within. Even Doctor Alvarez signed it, albeit with a noticeably shaky hand. Glances were exchanged, reluctant nods shared, but Hunter only chose to sign it after Diggle and Cassie and Karen already had. If anything was amiss here, as seemed increasingly more likely, he was not going to be able to learn what it was, would not be able to help, if he was stuck sitting out here in the van in the parking lot.

And Hunter had this morbid notion that, as soon as the others passed through the double metal doors painted with diagonal yellow and black stripes, someone would pull a gun and ‘remove’ him from the premises.

“Good…thank you.” Rodrigo gathered all of the signed forms, put them and the one extra information packet into a combination locked metal briefcase, which he then handed to the woman who had been collecting the signatures. “It is unfortunate that we seem to be missing someone…but their loss.” He smiled, prepared to put his keycard into the reader that would unlock the door, and hesitated. “Everyone ready?”

He did not wait for an answer. The door alarm sounded, a blaring tone loud enough that Cassie was sure several of the guard stations in the tunnel, and many inside the building, could hear it. Once the door was closed behind them, they would not be going back out without everyone being similarly alerted.

Inside the first small alcove, they were met with a blast of misty air that smelled heavily of disinfectant and sterilizing agents. Karen sneezed and rubbed her nose. Others did too.

“It is necessary that the environment be kept as sterile, as clean, as possible. We cannot introduce contaminating agents into the air which might have unanticipated effects on the projects here.”

“That explains the need for medical and vaccination records when we registered,” Hunter grunted.

“And probably how winners were selected,” whispered Karen. “Not a lottery at all…”

Rodrigo cleared his throat and waited for silence. It was unclear if he had heard their words, but he had heard them talking at least, and he was waiting for silence before continuing. Their guides had holstered their weapons now. “When we pass through these next doors, you’ll each be given sterile cleansuits to wear and sterile slippers. Your clothing will be tagged and kept in sealed lockers and returned to you when the tour concludes. Women to the left, men to the right. Please, remove everything, including jewelry, bandages, and underclothing. You will be taken through a secondary sterilization processes and then we will regroup in the lobby. And please be quick. There is a lot to see.”

Again Karen whispered, this time with trepidation in her voice, “Anyone else think this sounds eerily like Auschwitz…?” The men and women were already separating to their assigned sides, and while Rodrigo led the men, including Colonel Grishin, in one direction, the woman who had carried the briefcase led the women in the other.

Cassie nodded, having been thinking the same thing. Being separated from Hunter and Diggle, whom she had both come to see as necessary allies in what could become a combat situation, made her uneasy, but she forced those feelings deep inside so that Karen and the others could not see them. If she was the only woman with combat experience in the group around her, as she suspected she was, she was going to have to be extra watchful and cautious if she wanted to get all of them out of this alive.

As Rodrigo had explained, they were each prompted to strip, to drop their clothing into bags of thick plastic which were sealed airtight, marked with their names and the number of the cubby into which they were stored. The eleven women, Doctor Dorthea Rushing who had spoken not a word since the bus ride had begun, and even their guide who dressed down like the rest of them, gathered where another burst of disinfecting chemicals was sprayed upon them, this time enough to dampen their skin and saturate their hair. It was followed by cold blasts of air which dried their skin, though not their hair. They were given cleansuits and slippers, some lavender, some yellow, some white…with their guide and Doctor Rushing in blue, and once everyone was dressed, with their hair tucked beneath caps, they were led into the lobby where the men were also gathering. Only faces and hands were uncovered.

The men were similarly color coded.

“As you can see,” Rodrigo said as a handful of paper masks were given out at one end of the room so that each could take one and pass the rest along, “You have all been assigned to color groups. Most of the rooms and corridors will not accommodate large groups, and so you have been split up into teams to facilitate the tour.” Another door at the opposite side of the lobby opened and two men entered. One was a spidery individual, almost too thin beneath his cleansuit so that it hung from him like robes on a malnourished man, the other, his wizened, weathered features suggesting that he might be too old for the work he was doing here, had sharp eyes of ice blue. Rodrigo smiled at them both before looking back to their guests. “I would like to introduce all of you Doctor Mazur and Doctor Kozlov. They along with Doctor Rushing will be giving the tours today.

Kozlov. The name struck a chord in John’s mind, but he did not know why. From the looks of it, Karen and a few other knew the name as well, but it was a far smaller number than had recognized the company name.

“If the lavender group will please stand with Doctor Rushing and myself…group white with Doctor Mazur, and group yellow with Doctor Kozlov and Colonel Grishin…”

Doctor Alvarez gave out an unanticipated loud sigh that sounded, to Cassie, like one of relief.

“…we will get started without our tour.” Rodrigo finished.

Was it coincidence that placed the husband and wife Clan pair on the same team? That placed Clan in each, clones in each, that split teams nearly evenly with men and women, clones and humans, military and civilian? Was it coincidence that put her, Diggle, Karen and Hunter in the same group with Doctor Alvarez and a stodgy older woman with thick gray hair and sharp gray eyes?

It did not seem so to Cassie. They, the group wearing white, waited in a cluster as Mazur, his head bent over a clipboard, took a few minutes to consult with the other team leaders. Perhaps they were arranging the day’s agenda.

Whatever it was, the way Mazur whined gave Cassie a bad feeling.

Group one left the lobby, passing through the doors and turning into a corridor to the left. Group two did likewise, but turned right. After several quiet minutes during Mazur hastily scribbled notes upon his clipboard, glancing at each of his charges as if assessing them, comparing them to what was typed on the pages before him, he nodded, muttered to himself and opened the door. The hallway straight through, into which he pointed, was painted sterile white, lit to the point of being nearly blindingly bright, was still except for the electric hum of lights and distant equipment. It ended at an elevator door, which was where Mazur led them. The unknown individual among them, the heavier than average older woman who moved with ponderous slow steps, was the first to follow, the first to enter the elevator. The others, after looking at each other for reassurance, went as well.

There was no other viable choice, not if they were going to learn the secret of why they had been brought here as hostages rather than guests.

*

Matt felt better for having showered, even if the hotel shower had felt, and smelled, as if it wore a layer of grime that had not been washed off in weeks. Frank had let him shower first, choosing instead to nurse the steaming cup of coffee he’d picked up at the hotel desk when he rented the room. It did not matter that there was a single bed, with cigarette smoke so deeply embedded in the blankets, the mattress, the pillows; they weren’t going to be here long enough to sleep. By the time, Matt emerged from the bathroom, a towel barely in place around his hips, Oliver’s phone had begun to ring.

Frank drained his coffee and muttered, “Get that,” as he tossed the empty cup into the waste bin and disappeared into the bathroom himself.

“Yeah?”

“Thought you weren’t going to pick up,” Oliver said with a chuckle.

“Changing of the guard.” Matt did not explain himself and Oliver did not ask what he meant.

“You got an address?”

“Hold on…” The hotel name and address was printed on the key tab, faded and scratched, probably as old as the key itself. This was no electronic keycard, but rather a good old fashioned key, and Matt, running his thumb over it to ‘read’ what remained of the print, imagined the keys had been lost and returned innumerable times since the place had gone into business.

“Be there in fifteen…”

“Good…this place stinks…” He was afraid to sit on the chairs took as the stale cigarette and liquor smell clung there as well. If he sat, it might stick to him and he’d never be rid of it.

Odd he’d not felt that way in Frank’s flat despite the noticeable smells there.

Almost precisely fifteen minutes later, white delivery van pulled up in front of the room. The engine’s rumble sounded suspiciously similar to that of the van Frank had stolen. From the shifting of the bed, Matt judged Oliver’s bike to be in the back. The shuffle of two duffle bags of clothes was a welcomed sound. “Thank you,” he said gratefully as he accepted one of them.

“Hope it fits…”

“It will be good enough.” Better than standing barefoot in a towel in a room where he was reluctant to touch anything. He dressed quickly in the jeans, tee shirt, and loafers while Oliver knocked on the bathroom door and, after a quick “What?” from Frank, tossed the other duffle in for him.

Dressed, his suit stuffed into the duffle now to transport it inconspicuously across town, Matt stepped outside, breathing easier to be free of that room and preferring to wait there until it was time to leave. He listened to the distractions of the street, sirens and voices and vehicles, music and insects and the plethora of usual city birds, dogs barking and construction equipment and the normal rhythm of the river. Behind all of it, they were still near enough to the waterfront to know there were police investigating the area where the bus had been found, although the bus had been towed away now and there would be very little evidence there to find. Jack and Torelli had already left the scene.

“You bring any more coffee?”

“You can have all you want when we get to my place…”

Frank grunted, holding the passenger door of the van open for Matt as Oliver got in to the other side. He wasn’t going to sit in the middle…and Matt chose not to argue. “I’m going to hold you to that, Queen.”

Oliver nodded. He expected nothing less.

*

“Use my desk.” It wasn’t like Jack could get into his hotel room, not while the police had the hotel barricaded as they collected evidence and continued to take statements. Jack had tried to send the information he’d gained to his sources, but the laptop needed a charge, as did his phone and so the information exchange had needed to wait until he could plug in and recharge. Since Torelli thought it prudent to seek out his partner, or find out what was happening with Simpson, it left his desk free for Jack’s use for the time being.

“Thanks.” After plugging in both the computer and phone, Jack took the business card from his wallet and waited for his phone to hold enough charge to allow him to make a call.

He rubbed his eyes, his temples, and with his elbows propped upon the desk, took a few precious moments to close his lids and relax in the darkness behind them. The background chatter and phone traffic in the room formed a soothing backdrop that would have allowed him a few minutes sleep if he dared to allow it. He was running on adrenalin now, no sleep and no food, and while it was a state of being he had long ago become accustomed to, it wasn’t one that he enjoyed. He had come to the city to get away from chaos…a vacation. This was hardly that.

 

Torelli found his partner packing up the stuff from his locker and scowled. The tail end of the conversation he heard made no sense, and as he came around the corner, Simpson was already shoving his cell phone into his pocket and had resumed emptying his locker. It looked more like a permanent departure than a suspension, and he did not like it. “What gives, Simps?”

“Not gonna sit around here and be railroaded,” the other man muttered. “I’ve got other offers on the table…better offers…I don’t need the bullshit…”

“Oth…better? What the hell are you talking about?” He had known Simpson for a long time, had been partners with him for seven years, and not once had Simpson mentioned other offers, or a desire to get off the squad. Torelli had always assumed the two would retire together, or else would go down shooting together. “IA’ll back down once they…”

“Once they’ve made me an example? Fuck that. You saw that in there! You saw what went down. He had a gun for Christ’s sake…he was going to use it.”

“Yeah…he had a gun…” Torelli agreed with that part of the statement at least, but his tone was proof enough, without him saying the words, that he was not certain the man Simpson had killed had been about to shoot anyone.

“Hell, Tom…you tell them that, I’m as good as dead!”

Defensively, Torelli countered, “Tell them what? I didn’t see…”

“Exactly! You didn’t see…but you still think I…”

“Doesn’t matter what I think…IA only wants facts…and the fact is, I didn’t see. You’re a good cop, Simps…you’ve got a good record…”

Locker empty, Simpson slammed the metal door closed with a bang. “We’re both screwed because of that CP case and you know it. They’re never going to let us live that down…they’re gonna keep us as street cops forever…and now this? I need the money, Tom. I need to work. I can’t wait around for a promotion that will never come. I can’t wait to see if they’ll clear me or if they’ll dock me or worse. I’ve got prospects…”

“What sort of prospects? What will you do?” Torelli straddled the bench between the rows of lockers and leaned back with his arms propping him up. He watched as Simpson rearranged the contents of his box so that the flaps could be folded closed.

“I know some guys…private security…they’re making twice what we’re making…”

“Twice?” Giving a low whistle, Torelli momentarily wondered if he shouldn’t be considering a job with twice the pay as well. But he was in the midst of a huge case, a case that might make his career if he played it right; he knew he wouldn’t seriously consider leaving the force until the case was done, and probably not even then. He was too entrenched where he was.

And honestly, he knew Simpson; his partner would throw a tantrum, blow off steam, and once IA had gone through the motions, he’d be lured back into his position as if nothing had happened. That Central Park business had been BS…a fluke. They’d stepped on toes but now it was over.

Simpson didn’t respond.

“What am I supposed to do for a partner in the mean…”

“You’re new Federal buddy ought to keep you company enough until Barnstrum assigns someone else…” he muttered bitterly. “You’ll be fine.”

Choosing not to argue about Jack’s qualifications or the fact that he would never be a partner, Torelli countered, “Not the same, man, and you know it. Just…don’t do anything hasty…give it some time to…”

“Already done.”

“Already…you gave notice…?”

Simpson shrugged and tucked his box under his arm, balancing it against his side. “They already got my badge and my gun. They ain’t getting the rest of me too.” He made it as far as the locker room door, where he paused to look back at his partner and longtime friend. “I wouldn’t sit around and wait for them to screw you too, Tom…you want in…just say the word.”

“In to what?”

But Simpson was already gone without responding, as if his ‘prospects’ were some sort of mysterious secret.

Maybe, Torelli thought, he needed to have a talk with Barnstrum…or IA. Or maybe he should leave well enough alone and not interfere in what sounded like an investigation that might get messier by the day.

*

The first several rooms that were passed contained technical equipment of a sort Cassie did not understand beyond their ultimate functions. There were devices to mend broken bones, large and cumbersome now but destined, Mazur explained, for handheld versions that soldiers and emergency personnel might carry on duty to help the injured in the field. Another room contained large laser and light devices, the research there meant to find ways of using lasers and light waves of various colors, frequencies and intensities to combat a variety of cancers. There were animals in cages there, the usual mice, rabbits, monkeys…a few pigs…and at the rear of the room, behind closed doors, in tall ‘cages’ other creatures that could not be seen. Creatures, she imagined with a surge of revulsion and anger, that were probably clones.

With the ‘humanity’ of clones still under debate in the political and medical arenas, and in the public realm of colleges, popular opinion, and the court systems, there was no surprise that experimentation was being done upon them here. There were a number of clones at Tigh Ard who had escaped from such experimental facilities and conditions. How disgusted Cassie was by the thought was not going to change anything for those poor souls trapped here.

With any luck, they were dumb, mindless beings who had never known any other life. It would not make their suffering any less, but at least it might take the sting off if they had never known freedom.

There was a ward of beds, fifty or more by her count, patients suffering from a variety of ailments, some barely recognizable as human beneath the sores and disfigurements, boils and blood, of whatever they were inflicted with. Mazur assured them that these people had been brought here for treatment, but as Cassie met the gazes of more than one patient, some conscious enough to convey thought with those looks, others capable only of conveying their misery, she got the very strong impression that some of these patients had not come here by choice…and in fact may have found their ailments inflicted upon them by the Iaso staff as part of their testing processes.

She could not prove it, but Cassie was reasonably certain, after meeting Hunter’s indignant expression and Karen’s teary eyes, that her suspicions were correct.

The lottery winners might have been brought here for a tour, but she was growing more certain that there had never been any intention of allowing them to leave. They were being treated like guests now, but she did not think any of them had forgotten that they had been forced onto that bus at gunpoint…or the shootout and secrecy that had followed.

Other rooms were viewed, staff and personnel facilities, a cafeteria, sleeping chambers, a gymnasium and library and community room, suggested that the staff lived here as well as worked here, and Cassie wondered when any of them had last seen the sun. Though they had taken the elevator up several floors from where they had entered, there were no windows here, and so no way of telling if they were above ground now or not. No sounds penetrated from the outside, and the walls within were so well insulated that nothing could be heard from within the rooms they passed or entered, or from the corridors when they were within. Most often there was nothing but silence undercut by the perpetual hum of the lights and ventilation system, and the soft padding of slippered feet when staff passed by. It was like a tomb here, and Hunter, at least, was beginning to find the atmosphere particularly unnerving.

There were rooms where individuals, clone and human alike were participating in physical endurance and strength tests, rooms where they were engaged in a variety of intellectual testing meant to stimulate and enhance their minds as well as their bodies, rooms where men and women were connected to monitoring equipment meant to gauge every sort of internal process, be it mental, physical or emotional. Mazur explained that all of these men and women were voluntary test subjects, part of a program meant to adapt and enhance individuals for combat or other dangerous day to day jobs, efforts designed to keep both soldier, emergency worker, and the common man safer and better protected.

Never once however, did he explain precisely what was being done to these people, what sort of enhancements were being implemented…or how. It could have been something as relatively benign as splicing Clan DNA with normal DNA…although that was certainly not without its risks, or it could have been something far more dangerous.

For Cassie, not knowing was slowly eroding what little confidence in their hosts that remained. What if they too were destined to become test subjects? What if what they had signed was some sort of permission for experiments to be conducted on them?

The thought was making her sick.

She stopped at a large plate glass window with open blinds, behind which a number of individuals could be seen restrained upon beds, still, unmoving, either unconscious, or, she thought, obviously sedated. Most were connected to IV bags of clear fluid while staff wove between the beds, monitoring vitals, checking fluid levels, and measuring other signs of physical condition.

“Who are these people?” asked Karen. “Why are they here? Are they ill?”

“Oh no,” Doctor Mazur said, shuffling back to join the group who had all stopped at the window now as he had continued down the corridor. “These are all new recruits. They are held here in isolation until it is determined they are free of contagions and we have had a chance to establish a consistent baseline reading of all of the functions…”

Hunter frowned. “Then why are they sedated if they’re recruits…?”

“Sedated? Oh heavens no, dear boy…they’re asleep. They’re on night cycle now…hence the dim lighting.” The bony man pointed at the room lights which barely emitted a glow. “We do offer sedatives for those who have a difficult time adjusting to the artificial lighting here…who find the constant interruption of the monitoring staff to be intrusive and difficult to sleep through…but we do not make anyone…”

“Then why the IVs?”

“The ventilation system as a drying effect on many. Many of our subjects, as well as the staff, find hydration difficult to maintain in this atmosphere. Water consumption is mandatory, of the utmost importance, but in the first few days, while they are adapting, we’ve found it more expedient…easier…to use IVs to keep fluid levels up to acceptable levels.

It sounded plausible to Cassie. She knew that often time when a combat team came back from a mission, they received IV hydration, even nourishment, and were offered sleeping aids to help in adjustment. These people had not come in from combat, however, and though the doctor’s explanations were plausible, they did not sound ‘right’ to her.

Watching John’s fists ball at his sides as he reacted to the doctor’s condescending tone, Cassie did not think John believed the explanations fully either. At John’s side, Doctor Alvarez turned away from the window, his whole demeanor one of heartbreak and regret.

Doctor Mazur made a curt hand gesture to one of the attending staff. As the woman, with an expression of disdain and annoyance upon her face, reached for the controls that would turn the blinds closed, the man on the bed nearest the window weakly turned his head and looked at her with such a piteous, pleading look that Cassie felt tears rise in her eyes.

Willing volunteers my ass, she thought bitterly, catching sight, just as the blinds closed, of something she had not noticed sooner.

A cloning oven.

It took every bit of will and strength to swallow back the bile that rose in her throat.

The doctor’s cellphone emitted a long low tone, like a pager, Cassie judged, since he flipped it open, read whatever message had been sent, and then closed it again with an unchanging neutral expression.

“Please, come with me.”

He hurried them along the corridor, not waiting for them to keep up but throwing backward glances at them to be sure there were no stragglers. Alvarez had one hand under Cassie’s elbow as if he understood and empathized with her emotional plight, but none of them said anything. They were ushered into a small waiting room containing nothing more than a dozen chairs and a drinking fountain.

“There is a situation…I must attend to it. You will wait here until I, or one of my colleagues, returns for you. Please, make yourselves comfortable.” His hasty words were followed by the closing and locking of the waiting room door.

Hunter, the nearest to the door, tried the latch. As expected, it would not turn. “Well,” he muttered. “This can’t be good…”

*

“Thank you, ma’am…that was a damn good breakfast…”

Despite Frank’s usual gruffness, his politeness, his respectful manners towards women in particular, made Matt smile, though it was a smile he tried to disguise behind his juice glass so as not to raise Frank’s ire. Whatever his flaws, he’d been raised right, and his time in the military had honed that basic level of respect and decency. How he responded to Oliver, to the police whose tendency was to pull a gun on him…towards any thug or miscreant who dared to get on his bad side, was another matter, something born of conflict, both on the battlefield and in his personal life, and the stripping away of everything he cherished by men who were supposed to have his back. Frank was one complicated son of a bitch, one that Matt was glad to know…even if they didn’t always agree on the best way to remove criminals from the street.

Ruth smiled at the surly man with a look that suggested she was accustomed to men of his ilk. That she was obviously worried, words unspoken between her and Oliver, Matt also knew, and he imagined it had something to do with John Diggle, even though he could not see the multitude of photos in frames upon the walls, the mantle, even held on the refrigerator. If she knew who he or Frank were, she did not speak of it. She bid them welcome, prepared them pancakes and sausage in additions to those she had made for herself, and chatted lightly with them, small talk meant to get to know one another without delving too deep into personal information. Oliver knowing a lawyer, and another man in security…the same line of work as John, was in no way unusual, easily explainable, and did not lend itself to a need for scrutiny.

“You’re very welcome, Mr. Castle…please, leave the dishes. I’ll get to them later.” She rolled her chair back from the table, prompting Oliver to automatically rise to his feet. “We’ll speak later, Oliver? I want to hear all about the convention…” There was a note in her voice, an employer making a demand of an employee, that revealed more to their relationship then was visible at a glance.

Oliver swallowed and nodded. “Of course.” She would understand that ‘later’ might not be for a day or more, as the priority of finding John and bringing him home was more pressing.

Frank ignored Ruth’s instructions in favor of handwashing the breakfast dishes but none of them spoke in those tense moments after she left them alone. They were all weary, worried, and uncertain what would come next. They had no leads, and now that they were all showered and carrying contented full bellies, the night’s adrenalin had finally bled away, making them each long for much needed sleep. Any questions or considered conversation was kept to themselves. Oliver cleaned the table and put away the dishes after Matt dried them, and was just about to offer them a tour of the house and his lair when a small light on Oliver’s watch began to flash and beep.

Oliver’s eyes lit up.

“It’s on again,” he exclaimed in a hushed voice to keep Ruth from hearing him in the other room. “The homing device…it’s on.”

*

“What? Chloe? What is it?” Grateful that Torelli had found him an empty interrogation room to use, one where he hoped he was being given his privacy, Jack paced back and forth as he listened to Chloe frantically typing on the other end of the line. He’d given her the name from the business card, as well as the company moniker and address and the accompanying phone number and head been waiting as her computer programs ran their search through every database she was patched into. Most had turned up nothing useful, as if the owner of that card did not exist. Unwilling to believe it to be a dead end, knowing that someone with a business card, with a business, had to exist somewhere, Chloe had turned to the last resource she had…only to hit a wall of encryption the likes of which she rarely came across. When she did, the data behind it invariably belonged to some governmental agency, someone protecting someone, hiding projects or plans or purchases and sales, something that some government did not want the public to gain access to.

In the case of most of the public, the paperchase would stop there. There were only a small fraction of people capable of penetrating this much encryption and coding, a small fraction with the hacking skills capable of digging through to the root data.

Chloe O’Brien was one of them.

“That’s why I know it, Jack…Essex…they’re a government subsidiary…defense contracts…biotechnical engineering…”

“What do you mean…?”

“Think Roxxon, Jack…Iaso…these are the big guns, Jack…the type of boys you don’t want to play with…” Only Chloe knew Jack well enough to know that he DID want to play with them, and that he wasn’t afraid to go up against the big guns if it meant protecting those he cared about. She did not know who Cassie was…but she knew the girl was important to Jack, and that was more than reason enough for Jack to stick his neck out. The fact that there was some serious question of ethics going on here would only strengthen his resolve.

“English, Chloe? Who are these people? What do they do? What do they want?”

“Genetic engineering…cloning…DNA research…super soldiers, Jack. They’re contracted to the government…several it appears…to manufacture super soldiers…”

Hence the abduction of soldiers, researchers, and doctors. As subjects, Jack wondered, or as researchers and assistants. Maybe all of the above…

The address on the card, however, was in Virginia and Jack doubted the hostages had been taken that far south. They would be in transport still, if that was the case, making them difficult to find since there was no vehicle description to look for. If the hostages had been taken across state lines from New York into New Jersey, as it appeared, that was bad enough.

“Do they have any other facilities? Addresses…offices or labs or anything…employees even…in Jersey or New York or…?”

“Shit! Gotta go, Jack…”

He knew panic in her voice when he heard it. “Chloe? Talk to me.”

“Being backtraced…I’ve gotta shut down before they hack back to me…find the source of their breech…I’ll call you when I can, with anything else I find.”

In his mind’s eye, Jack could see her slamming the laptop closed, unplugging wires and chords and probably doing the same to her desktop computer which she would have been using to multitask her search. He didn’t know when, or if, he would hear from her again, couldn’t know if anyone from Essex might be sent to ‘handle’ the breech in a way more permanent than an electronic response. He surged to his feet, intending to go to her home, get her and Morris to safety before anyone else could get to them, but as he did so, his phone rang again, a different tone this time.

Not from home. Not from Chloe.

“I’ve got a signal! If we hurry, we might be able to trace it to where the hostages are.”

The Arrow.

Jack threw open the interrogation room door. “Torelli!” he shouted. “We gotta go!”


	10. 10

Plans were made over Oliver’s voice altered phone as Frank drove, following Oliver’s directions. Not knowing what they might find at the other end of that tracker beacon but not wanting to alert the kidnappers of their approach, it was decided that reconnaissance was their first priority. The three of them now knew each other’s faces, the secrets having been revealed as soon as Oliver had picked Frank and Matt up from the grimy hotel, and further erased and eroded over breakfast. But the two men Oliver spoke with over the radio knew only Frank’s face, and it seemed wisest to keep it that way for now.

Besides, broad daylight did not afford any of them the opportunity of disguise, as Daredevil and Arrow would draw far too much attention.

They crossed the tunnel into New Jersey and drove north east on busy streets, forced into turns off of one way streets, detours around road and water main repairs, back tracking from dead ends, always pulled by the sporadic signal that seemed to be weakening the closer they got to it. The signal should have been growing stronger, not weaker, and the only explanation Oliver could offer was that the device was failing. If Felicity were still with him, she could tell him where that signal would take them, where their journey would end. Without her, just how public that location would be was a shot in the dark…without her, he had to hope that the signal wasn’t growing fainter due to some malfunction that was drawing them in a totally wrong direction.

There was assurance from Jack that his person could patch into the signal, identify its location via satellite, guide them, prepare them for what they would find. But whoever that person was, Bauer was having difficulty connecting with her, leaving Oliver to track the beacon the hard way, calling directions over the phone to Jack and Torelli so that they could find their way from somewhere far behind.

“We’re close…somewhere over…there…” Oliver pointed.

Frank grunted, not liking what he was seeing. The setting brought with it flashbacks of a night he did not want to keep reliving, a nightmare he had yet to learn to escape. “You sure?”

“What…where are we…?” With the windows closed and the air conditioning offering him little except recycled air that filtered away smells from the outside, there were few clues for Matt to work with. He could hear the muted sounds of children at play, the barking of dogs, conversation…running feet, panting breaths, the crack of a bat and ball followed by the cheering roar of a crowd. The sounds painted an abstract mental image within his head, so that, as Frank parked the car, Matt murmured, “A park. Are you sure?”

That made no sense. Why would the kidnappers have taken two dozen hostages to a public park?

Nodding, Oliver said, “The signal is strongest here…” There was dismay in his voice as he said it. There was a strong likelihood that someone had found the tracker and, not knowing what it was, was carrying it around like some sort of souvenir. Or that the second transport vehicle had driven through here on its way somewhere else, the tracker dropping off as the vehicle thumped over one of the speed bumps he could see. Or maybe the hostages had been delivered to their destination and one of the kidnappers had come here for a little r and r.

“Just your place, Red,” Frank muttered as he got out of the car.

“My sort of…”

“Hold off,” Oliver said into the phone. “Might have a false alarm here…”

“Where are you?” Jack growled on the other end of the phone. It didn’t matter what the Arrow thought; Jack was going to make his own assessment of the location…as soon as he knew where that location was.

It was Frank’s voice, muffled and distant to Jack’s ear now that Oliver had taken it off of speaker phone and Frank had gotten out of the car, that answered, “James Braddock Park.”

Matt was surprised by the unexpected rush of electricity over his skin, hearing those words as he got out of the car as well, hit by the fullness of data that blasted his senses. He remembered the stories shared between the men at Fogwell’s gym, the legend that was James Braddock to men like Matt’s father and those he shared the ring with. When his grandmother would start in with the accusations of ‘the devil in the Murdock boys’, his father often countered with the honor of living up to Braddock’s legacy…being a Hell’s Kitchen man like Braddock. Truth was, Matt understoodnd now, that swinging his fists was, for his father and others like him, the only skill they had with which to scrape out a living for their family. Maybe the same had been true for Braddock, but to the boxers, holding Braddock up as a hero, something to aspire to, made what they did worthwhile…gave them something to be proud of for as long as their luck could hold.

Matt still wondered, during moments in the night when sleep eluded him, whether Jack Murdock had what it took to be the next Braddock…if only he had not fallen in with the wrong backers…if only he had not been killed for his choices.

He had never been here, not alone nor with his father…and Matt suspected his father had never been here either. Unwittingly, he had made this pilgrimage…although he would not, he knew, have the opportunity to enjoy it. Not until Karen and the others were safe.

“We’re fifteen minutes out,” Jack barked.

“We’re not waiting.”

Jack only just heard the other man’s voice. “Castle. You’re waiting.”

Frank, however, could not hear him, and was already striding into the park.

“Wait, Frank…we need a plan…” called Oliver, before saying into the phone, “Call me when you’re here,” and hanging up on Jack. He was with Frank on this one; it made no sense to wait for the cop and the federal agent. It would give away their identities, not to mention looking suspicious if the five of them wandered through the park together. The three of them, in jeans and tees at least looked casual, and Matt had the boxer angle to use as his excuse for being here should anyone ask.

Not that it seemed anyone should. There were people walking dogs, running the trails Oliver could see, enjoying picnic lunches on benches or blankets, kids playing on the nearby playground equipment, people casually strolling. Though he had never been here, Oliver knew enough about the park to know there were a number of sporting venues here…and so slinging the dufflebag over his shoulder that had been riding with Murdock in the backseat gave him the appearance of someone intending a day of sport.

Frank just looked like Frank…dour and anti-social. The fact that he stuck close to the man with the cane, however, even lent him an excuse for being here. There wasn’t a thing suspicious about any of them.

“We have a plan.”

“Do you know where we’re going?” Oliver countered, a challenge in his voice as he turned off the audible tone to the beacon tracker in his watch. Watching it as he walked could be written off as one of those step counters he knew so many fitness buffs used.

“Doesn’t matter. We wander like tourists until your gizmo gets a hit…”

Matt frowned. “That would be wasting time…”

“Standing here arguing is wasting time…”

“This way.” Oliver ended any argument by heading left, skirting the large playground with its host of parents and children, trying to keep his pace steady instead of letting it look like he was a man on a mission. As it was, despite their casual dress, the three grown men without children were garnering curious and uneasy looks from the parents…until they noted Matt’s cane and dark glasses. Finding him no threat, his pace setting a non-suspicious pace for the others, it took mistrust off the others as well and they were now ignored beyond the curious glances as they passed.

At the edge of the playground, Oliver hesitated to check the signal again. There was a gazebo ahead of them and beyond that, a large building, largely windowless. “There.”

Matt cocked his head, listening, scenting and tasting the air, assessing details his companions could not see with their eyes. From where they stood, the building was nondescript, plain enough to perhaps not even be part of the park complex.

“Garage…offices…I’d say park maintenance…security offices…”

“We’re not getting in there in broad daylight unless you want me to…”

“Gunfire at midday is going to attract too much attention,” started Oliver.

Frank scowled at him behind Matt’s back. “I’m not an idiot,” he snarled. His family had died in a broad-daylight firefight in a park. He would never dream of taking such a risk and was insulted that Oliver thought he would.

“I can do it,” Matt interjected. “I can get in there…take a look around. You look around outside…see what you can find…”

Oliver’s phone buzzed. He scowled. “Need to take this.” Putting off Bauer was only going to bring he and Torelli in, guns blazing, in the search for them. “I’ll distract them…you two get busy.”

Frank went left, to where some vehicles and a large dumpster were parkted at the end of the building, vehicles he thought looked to be beyond repair, possibly being kept for parts for other park vehicles. He knew a thing or two about engines; maybe he could attract attention and get some of the staff engaged in conversation, find out what they knew. He hated small talk, but sometimes it was necessary. Matt went right, towards the two story end of the building; there would be a door there that would get him inside without the need for talk at all.

Oliver watched them long enough for his phone to ring a few more times before he answered it.

“We’re here. Where are you?”

“Scouting the park…”

Torelli snorted. “It’s a big damn park. Care to be a little more specific?”

“We’re not giving you our faces, officer…”

“Maybe not…but we can’t assist if you don’t give us something to go on”

Frank was now leaning over the front of one of the skeletal vehicles, peering beneath the raised hood, whistling to himself in a way that would definitely draw attention from where Matt was disappearing around the northern edge of the building. It wouldn’t distract everyone, but a few less people for Matt to deal with was probably a good thing.

“Maintenance building…west of the playground. Signal ends here.”

“Copy…we’ll be there soon.”

Not intending to make his presence obvious, Oliver camped out at an empty picnic table, his arms resting upon his duffle bag, hoping to appear as if he was casually waiting for someone instead of watching the building. It wasn’t long before he saw the two men, Torelli out of uniform, marching resolutely towards the maintenance compound. Torelli had no jurisdiction here, of course; his uniform and badge would have only gained him disrespect. But Jack’s badge just might be enough to gain them admittance, or at least to get some questions answered. From the backside of the building, however, Oliver was going to be no help at all, and so he left his table to find somewhere that would get him a better view, where he could watch the doors, both to the garages and the office buildings, in case anyone suspicious came onto the scene. What he needed was a way to communicate with the others. Without one, he had to rely on them to manage on their own.

*

“You shouldn’t be here.” The freckled fellow in greasy overalls had taken his radio from his pocket as if to report a trespasser, but he was not armed and had not yet attempted to call anyone

Frank had the impression he wasn’t the first person to wander into this area.

“What happened to her?” he asked, thumbing over his shoulder at the engine beneath the raised hood.

The guy bent down enough to read the license plate before replying. “Oil gage stuck…some idiot didn’t check the oil…engine seized.”

Nodding, Frank said, “Too bad…I haven’t seen an engine like this in ages…she’s an antique…I had one like this in the old pickup I learned to drive in.” He glanced down the side of the rusting metal body, noting the now missing tires and the cement blocks that kept the vehicle up off the ground. “I could’ve gotten her running before she got stripped down…poor girl…”

The garage attendant seemed to have forgotten his intention to chase Frank away. “Would have required a new engine…”

“Maybe,” Frank shrugged. “Maybe not. That old truck of mine…I had to learn to strip the engine down and put it back together before my dad would teach me to drive it…once you’ve done that you can fix anything…at least in these old beauties.”

“That’s for sure. These new engines are too damned complicated…can’t do anything without the computers and diagnostic equipment to check them over. Your dad sounds damn smart…”

“He had his moments. This is what…72 model?”

“71…”

“Even better…”

Leaning against the car as they slid into an in-depth discussion of the pros and cons of various engine models of different years, or ways they might have saved this engine, this old truck, from the fate it now endured, Frank was able to scan the entire open yard of the maintenance sheds. Pickup trucks and smaller golf-cart like vehicles, some loaded with repair or gardening tools, trash bins, irrigation equipment and the like came and went through the driveway on the northeast side of the yard. People went in and out of the multi-story building attached to the garage nearest him, and though none of them were Murdock, Frank assumed the blind man had gotten inside, probably before Frank had turned to join this fellow in dialogue. To his right, he lost sight of that arrogant prick Oliver, but Torelli and Bauer had now reached the gazebo, where they hesitated to look around them, probably hoping to locate the three men who had led them here. If they saw Franj there, they did not recognize him over the distance between them. Bauer tried to make a call, perhaps, thought Frank, with the hopes of hearing Oliver’s phone ring and being able to trace him that way. But nothing in the vicinity rang, and no one visible answered a phone that could have been in silent mode. It looked as if Bauer swore as he shoved the phone into his pocket, but he pointed into the direction of the maintenance buildings and the pair began to stride in Frank’s direction.

Not wanting to be noticed, Frank turned around to face the engine, using the mechanic’s body as a shield. He kept his head down and ignored their approach while also keeping track of how close they came.

“Who’s in charge here?”

Torelli’s voice grated on Frank’s nerves like sandpaper but he refused to look up.

The mechanic looked up enough to say, “He’s in there,” with a pointing to the garage, before he returned to the conversation with Frank. Jack and Torelli continued on, and only when they disappeared into the building di Frank turn again to resume his leaning, watchful position. He wanted to know where they had gone, what they find out; maybe by watching for them, he could learn some morsel of proof of the hostages fate.

*

Two sets of trained eyes drank in their surroundings as they approached the first open garage door, where two men were working on a park vehicle and another bent over a workbench with his back to them. Nothing appeared unusual, nothing out of place, a typical garage, a typical park maintenance facility. The two looked at one another, each nodding once, before Jack cleared his throat and called out, “Which one of you is Barbson?

The guy at the workbench, stocky and short, with a thick shock of graying blonde tied at the back of his neck, turned. “That’d be me…somethin’ I can do for you fellas?”

“Jack Bauer, CTU.” Jack flashed his badge, feeling grateful he hadn’t turned the badge over yet. “We’re following up on vehicle theft…” It was partially true, as the bus the kidnappers had used had been reported missing from bus yard right about the time the damaged bus had been found abandoned. As high profile as the kidnapping was becoming, the news of it having spread to all the regional television outlets, Jack didn’t want his name attached to it…at least not yet. If that news got back to Tigh Ard, he hoped that, with the victims’ names being withheld from the press, and Jack’s name unmentioned, neither of Cassie’s parents would learn of it until the situation was in hand.

With Barbson looking rightfully confused about what part he or his garage might have in such a matter, Torelli picked up the dialogue. “We’ve reason to believe the thieves brought it through the park sometime during the night or early this morning. You or any of your guys see or hear anything? Find anything unusual…?”

“What’s New York cop have to do here in Jersey?” Barbson said suspiciously.

“It was stolen in his jurisdiction,” explained Jack. “Officer Torelli is helping me…”

Barbson snorted. “Night crew’s not here now…but no one made any reports of anything peculiar…unless you wanna call a couple of meth heads dancing naked by the lake and a group of kids attempting a séance in the gazebo to be peculiar enough.”

Peculiar, yes, but in no way connected to a kidnapping, Jack suspected. Still they might have seen something, if there was anything to see. “Anyone happen to get the kids’ names or…”

“Chased ‘em off…they weren’t hurting anything just bein’ somewhere they shouldn’t be.”

“And the dancing meth heads?” asked Torelli.

The chief mechanic shrugged. “Cops took them in when they refused to leave and started to get violent…”

Another look was exchanged. They couldn’t question the kids, but maybe they could question the dancers. Odds were they wouldn’t remember anything either, but it was worth the effort to question them.

“I can pull some strings…find out where they were taken…maybe track them down,” Torelli offered.

Jack nodded. “Anyone else might have been on duty here? The security officers that you mentioned?”

“Check with the office,” Barbson replied. “Timmons and Smith and Klein were on last night I think. I heard the talk over coffee in the breakroom after shift change but didn’t see them myself…just everyone chattering about the excitement.”

“Thanks.” Torelli pulled a business card from his shirt pocket and handed it to Barbson. “Call me if you think of anything that might help…it’s a dark colored bus with bullet holes…wouldn’t been hard to miss it…”

Scowling, Jack threw Torelli a scolding look, but those few clues, which might have given away the true nature of their case to anyone who’d been following it closely since the hostage situation the day before, did not spark anything in Barbson’s eyes. Maybe stolen buses were more common around here then Jack knew.

*

With no need for guards at the office door, Matt got inside easily enough, no one noticing as there was no one at the desk right inside the door, and few windows that would allow anyone outside to see him. He could hear voices in offices, in the breakroom, in storage closets and corridors, voices speaking on phones or chatting between small groups about the days’ work ahead of them, about a ballgame the night before, about children and spouses and plans for after-hours drinks. Stories traded about kids caught in the gazebo attempting to summon celebrity spirits, a plastic raft with a dog tied to it found floating at the northern edge of the lake, a man and woman high on meth dancing nude beneath the full-moon to some strange ‘foreign crap’ playing on an old cassette player left on a grass-stained blanket along with a variety of drug paraphernalia that landed them in jail after a particularly nasty fight with the arresting officers.

None of that, however, suggested that anyone here now knew of a kidnapping, knew of a stolen bus full of hostages. Indeed, none of them spoke about the Hell’s Kitchen hostage situation at all. It had been on radio and television broadcasts since last evening, snippets of the reports coming to Matt’s ears as he had listened for more important details to help them locate the hostages. Either these people working here paid little attention to the news or else the events across the river were deemed of little consequence here.

Matt made it from room to room, ducking the dozen employees with ease. They were park administrative staff and a handful of other park employees, men and women responsible for upkeep, for arranging events, for managing public relations, for scheduling work shifts and handling financial matters in conjunction with whatever city or state entities funded the park’s upkeep and employees. Nowhere within the building was there anywhere to contain two dozen hostages, nowhere was there a huddled, frightened mass of bodies waiting for rescue. There were two fire exits in addition to the main entrance on the first floor, and the floor above him had a stairwells at each end to facilitate emergency escape when the central elevator was out of order, but none of those exits seemed suspicious or lent themselves to the hiding of hostages either.

What did spark Matt’s suspicions was a peculiar hollow sucking echo, the sound of air movement drawing up through a metal encased shaft when the elevator took a pair of women to the second floor…and then forced that same air down when it returned to its at-rest position on the ground floor. The air was not pushed out around the elevator door or the walls that encased it, nor was it held trapped in the space immediately below the elevator car where the machinery that drove the car was housed. The sound was encased in the space immediately adjacent to the elevator, a space between the elevator and the ground level supply closet, space that, to most, was dead space, unused and empty wall space likely expected to contain insulation or perhaps even an access hatch to allow for repair of the elevator when it malfunctioned.

But it was a space that hummed with an electrical buzz, a space that stretched down into the earth beneath the building far deeper than any repair shaft should have reached. Curious, knowing further investigation would either require getting into the elevator or the supply closet, neither of which would be easy to do mid-day, Matt was about to act when he heard voices at the front desk…familiar voices.

Bauer and Torelli.

He scowled. Any efforts to investigate now might rouse their suspicions, make him a suspect since they would not know he and the Daredevil were one. After a few moments of quick thinking, he stepped out of the recessed doorway he had been standing in, and using his cane as it was intended to be used, he tapped his way across the hall until his outstretched hand closed around the latch of the supply closet door, making as much noise as he could.

It did not have a locking mechanism. Good.

“Excuse me, sir,” said a man from his other side, a man whose rough voice and labored breathing spoke of too many years of cigarette smoking and too much shouting. “You can’t go in there…”

“I’m so sorry,” Matt replied with as strong of an apologetic tone as he could muster. “I was told there was a restroom…”

“Dunno who told you that…but this isn’t a public building. You’re not supposed to be in here.” It sounded as if he was curbing his annoyance due to Matt’s blindness, a sound Matt was familiar with and often worked to his advantage. The man had a tight grip upon Matt’s elbow as he turned him back towards the front door, intending to escort him out of the building.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated. “Perhaps you could direct me…”

A woman’s light, staccato heels clicking on the tiled floor approached from the same direction where the man had come. “For crissake, Jeff, don’t be a worm. Show the man to the bathroom. You aren’t seriously going to make him walk across the park to one of the public restroom, are you?” Her voice held a note of command, a scolding tone that made the man at Matt’s side bristle.

Jeff mumbled something beneath his breath that Matt could not make out, likely a cursing retort in a tongue Matt did not know, and, as the woman continued on towards the front desk, shuffling a collection of folders in her arms, Jeff did as she instructed. Behind him, before he and Jeff reached a door on the other side of the supply closet, Matt could feel the eyes of those at the front desk following him. He would have been fine with being escorted out of the building, it was what he had expected, but he could just as easily make a show of using the bathroom as well.

Whatever aroused the least amount of suspicion.

It was only the ‘you can’t go in there,’ that caused both Torelli and Jack to glance down the corridor as they waited for the woman behind the front desk to direct the call she had answered to the extension it was intended for. The spectacle, a blind man looking for restroom, meant nothing to Torelli, and so he leaned his elbows upon the counter and continued to smile at the receptionist. To Jack, however, that exchange meant a great deal, as he connected the blind man to one of the three vigilantes they were pursuing hostages with. It took willpower, and the receptionists voice, not to follow into the restroom.

“I love your flowers…” Torelli ran his fingers over the mixed bouquet to lend credence to his statement. “Whoever he is, he’s obviously got good taste.”

“They’re from my mother,” she giggled with a sweet, flirtatious smile and flush to her young cheeks that made Torelli smile wider. It didn’t matter that she was barely out of her teens. In Torelli’s book a little flirting never hurt anything…so long as he didn’t cross into the danger zone of sexual harassment. “What can I do for you gentlemen?” 

“Tommy Torelli, NYPD…and Agent Bauer, CTU. We’re pursuing reports of a stolen bus said to have driven through your park; Mr. Barbson suggested we speak to you about the security detail on watch last night…any activity that might have occurred…anyone who might have seen anything…”

While the receptionist typed a few keystrokes that brought up a work roster on the screen and flipped pages in her log book to examine a list of who might have signed in and out the day before, Jack kept half of his attention on bathroom door where the other men had disappeared. He wasn’t exactly expecting a fight, but he wasn’t ruling the possibility out. He only barely heard mention of the names Barbson had given them, one of the three having been here in the office accepting a supply delivery while the other two had been out on patrol around the grounds. A delivery of what, Torelli asked. Bathroom and cleaning supplies, office supplies, breakroom supplies. Such deliveries most often came during the day, but evening deliveries weren’t unheard of, when road or traffic conditions forced the drivers behind schedule. She showed Torelli the supply invoice, every item delivered checked off, the date and time scrawled across the top by the driver.

Torelli asked about the footage from the security tapes, which she was all too happy to supply him with the backup copy, so long as he returned it to her as soon as possible, before her boss discovered it missing. By this time, the bathroom door opened and, though the park employee no longer steered the blind man with a grip on his arm, he did escort him back to the front door.

Jack was sure, as the pair passed, that the blind man knew he was there. He was sure the man…Murdock wasn’t it?...knew who he was, knew Torelli’s voice, even though he did not look in their direction or acknowledge them in any way. Why would he? But Jack was just as sure that, if there was anything to be found within this building, Murdock had found it. And if Murdock was here, the other two men were not far away.

“Thank you…” he said hastily, hoping he had appeared attentive to the conversation and not distracted, although he doubted the receptionist, as enraptured by Torelli as she was, had even notice. “You’ve been very helpful…”

“We’ll get this back to you as soon as possible. You take care of these flowers now…I expect them to still be lovely when I return.”

“Oh, I will,” she promised him. “And you’re welcome, officer.” Her phone rang again and she smiled and wiggled her fingers at Torelli in farewell as she answered it.

“Think you can get this analyzed while I track down our dancing druggies and the security detail from last night?” Torelli asked. It was going to take time to watch all that footage, but he figured Jack had security clearance enough to get it done quickly, whereas he had the clout to pull strings and find the people they needed to question. He also knew that the whereabouts of Jack’s ‘source’, who had failed to answer his calls, was eating at him. Giving him the opportunity tend his private matters, dividing the work, made sense, and any meeting between them and the other three wasn’t likely to occur until sundown. It gave them all day to work…though it was too many hours of the hostages being at risk and Torelli didn’t like it.

There was nothing obvious here, however, and without a search warrant, that a New York cop wasn’t likely to get from Jersey judge, they couldn’t investigate further until they had darkness on their side.

“Yeah…I can do that…” They bumped into the man Jeff as they exited the building, but by the time they made it outside, Murdock was no longer in sight. Jack scowled, opened his phone and punched in the number he now had memorized.

Maybe he should put it on speed dial.

“I dunno where the hell you are…but we’ve got some names, some leads to follow…”

“As do we” Oliver did not know what, if anything, Frank or Matt had found, as he had not yet regrouped with them, but he was confident that one of them had to have gotten something. “Ten o’clock? At the gazebo.”

“Ten o’clock.” Of course, if Jack found anything before then, he was moving in. He didn’t need darkness to operate and to hell with waiting for the others. Getting Cassie and the other hostages out safe was all that mattered.

*

They’d been in the waiting room for hours. Karen did not have her watch, none of them did as all such items had been confiscated before the van’s arrival had dumped them into this distorted vision masking as reality. With nothing to read and only a series of commercialized videos about the ‘great and miraculous’ research being undertaken here that played upon the small computer monitor built into one of wall adjacent to the door to occupy them, most in the group had taken turns dozing, the adrenalin pumping events of the night and following tedious boredom leading to an inevitable exhausted crash. Periods of sleep for those of military training, as the need for vigilance remained even if there was no noticeable threat. They fell into a rhythm, sleeping briefly in turn, until even that effort ceased.

They’d either outwaited the need for more sleep or else sleep had grown bored and wary too.

“How long do you think we’ve been here?” Karen murmured, rubbing her wrist where her watch should have been.

“Too long,” replied Diggle.

“Or not long enough apparently,” Hunter snarked. He was stretched out upon the floor where he had done his best to try to sleep. Whatever was going to come next, if they were to get out of here, it was going to take all of their alertness, strength, and willpower. But the harsh sterile whiteness of the walls, compounded by the fluorescent lights, their hum feeding a constant bass note beneath the eternal propaganda footage was all designed to eat away at them as surely as this waiting was, and if didn’t succeed in lulling them into some false stuporous state, it would surely drive them mad.

“What sort of emergency do you think…”

“No emergency.” Dr. Alvarez shook his head but he did not raise it or look at anyone. He had sat with his chair in corner, elbows on his knees, head hanging down with his hands balled beneath his chin. Cassie had been the one to notice his position in relation to the television, how he had made sure that his corner was along the same wall, the way he occasionally turned his face just enough to suggest he was looking for something on the edge of that screen or perhaps on the screen itself. Then he would lower his head again and continue to sit in silence. She could think of only one thing he was suspecting to find there, and so she took the opposite corner, which would put her behind the door if it opened again, 

“They can’t keep us here…I need a bathroom,” the stodgy woman whined, her sharp gray eyes now dulled with boredom and eroded confidence.

“He told you not to drink the water,” Hunter said, thumbing towards Alvarez. Hunter was just wary enough to suspect that the warning not to drink the water had held some deeper meaning, but the lack of an available bathroom had been an obvious deterrent to drinking on its own.. The longer they waited, the less likely it looked like they would be released any time soon, the stronger the need had been to avoid filling their bladders. Eventually, however, thirst would compel them all to drink…bathroom or not…tainted water or no.

She scoffed. “They’re going to have to feed us…they can’t have forgotten us here…”

“Forgotten…no, I doubt it.” That much Diggle felt sure of. That and the constant prickle that suggested they were being monitored. It had kept him from talking to the others, kept him from developing a plan of escape, but it had not kept him from either checking the door handle more than once or from studying, at a discreet distance, the plumbing penetrations of the fountain…or the single ventilation screen above their heads at the center of the room. It was just big enough that most of them would fit through it…if they dared attempt an escape that way, but John and the grey eyed woman would likely not fit. He could remain behind, fight off anyone who came to stop them…but he didn’t think she would be of any use in a fight.

If he could locate the monitoring cameras, the bugs, if he could somehow use the tracker arrow tip to interfere in their signals…but that was out of his skill set, and he had not yet dared attempt a discreet discussion with either Hunter or Cassie as to what skills they possessed. Medical most likely…which wasn’t going to help them at all. And hadn’t the woman Karen said something about being a journalist. No help there either.

Damn it, Oliver. Hurry up.

But Oliver likely had even less of an idea where they were then John had.

No. How they were going to get out of this was not yet obvious. Hunger, thirst and the need for a toilet had not yet begun to erase their hope, had not yet given birth to irrational fear.

He met Cassie’s gaze. She nodded. She was working on the same puzzle, as was Hunter who, despite the overall blankness on his face as he stared at the ceiling, was scanning the room with barely noticeable movement of his eyes. They just might get out of this…but it wouldn’t be any time soon.

*

Chloe’s apartment had been ransacked, stripped from top to bottom by thorough hands looking for the traces of the hacker who had breached highly secure information systems. Jack’s scowling frown grew deeper as he poked about room to room, looking for the same clues. Where had she gone? Had she left any identifying clues behind.

But Chloe was smart. So was Morris. Beyond the un-erasable DNA evidence sunk into bedding, carpet, a hamper full of dirty laundry, there was nothing left that might have suggested her identity or her location. No paper trail left behind, not a single piece of mail with a name on it. No personal document, no family letters or newspaper. She had gone to ground, as her training and instincts had taught her. Someone at CTU might know where she was by now, but tracing her through that route was going to open up a door Jack was not ready to step through.

Wherever she was, she would get his messages. Wherever she was, she would reach out to him when she felt it safe to do so. She’d likely be angry at first that he’d gotten her into this, but she knew him. She knew he would never intentionally put her in harm’s way. She knew that he’d had no idea what he was getting himself into by trying to aid a group of civilian hostages.

Jack couldn’t have known…but damn it, how did stuff like this always find him?

He heard the crunch of a boot on glass a split second before the shot came, enough of a warning that he was able to drop to avoid the bullet meant to remove him from the apartment. When he came up, gun in hand, he narrowly avoided a second shot before taking his own. His effort cost his opponent the use of his hand, causing his gun to clatter to the floor. Choosing to save his bullets, as he hadn’t brought an extra clip…since he had not expected to actually need the gun when he’d come on this ‘vacation’, Jack charged across the room, tackled the other man to the floor, where he struck his head on the corner of the broken wooden coffee table hard enough to knock himself unconscious.

Undoubtedly, Jack thought as he rummaged through the man’s pockets for anything which might identify him, he had been watching the apartment with the instruction to kill the occupants, assuming that anyone entering would either be the hacker or a cohort. Shoot first, ask questions later. The likelihood that others were watching too, or would come when this fellow didn’t report in, led Jack to snapping a photo of the man with his cell phone and forwarding it to Chloe’s number, with a note that said only, “Don’t go home.”

He’d learned all he needed to learn here, all that he was going to learn at least, until Chloe reached out to him. With nothing more he could do for her except hope she was safe, he left the apartment for greener pastures…like the possibility of finding something worthwhile on the security tape.

He had to find something. It seemed the more they looked, the less they found, and he was beginning to fear that, with each hour that passed, Cassie and the hostages were running out of time.


	11. 11

When Sentinel senses finally located the tiny pinpoint on the front of the television screen, the monitoring camera that Dr. Alvarez’s behavior had tipped her off to, Cassie assessed those in the room, dropped one hand to her side, where her legs shielded it from the camera. Only one person could see it from there, but as she felt he was one of their best chances of getting out of this place alive, she patiently waited for him to see her hand signal…one she repeated over and over in the hopes he would understand it.

‘Can we disable the camera?’

Morris code. Diggle cocked his head, caught her eye with surprise, and after a few moments of thought, replied, ‘I think so’ with gestures hidden by the bulk of his body. He too had figured out the best point for a monitoring device, either on the tv unit or the screen itself, and so had moved to sit as far to the edge of its periphery as the room would allow.

He could jam that arrow into the screen, into the bug itself…which would likely short it out…but there was only one problem after that…

‘Wouldn’t take them long to notice.’

‘The vent.’

‘Yes.’ She might have been a medic, but she also had other significant training. She was also, Diggle had earlier determined, more level headed then that loose cannon Hunter. ‘We won’t all fit.’

‘It’s wider than it looks.’ The grated opening was narrower than the shaft behind it; the way the air flow changed between the sound in the shaft and that which was forced through the grate suggested a wide enough passage for them all to fit in…if they could get beyond the grate.

Wondering what she sensed that he didn’t, John stared at the vent. He couldn’t even feel the flow of air that came from that vent and was then sucked through a smaller grate beneath the water fountain to be recycled and recirculated throughout the complex. Both the air coming in, and the air going out, had to have an external source. If they followed the ducting long enough, they had to reach the surface.

It would be helpful if they had someone who could hack into the camera feed…make it look like they were all still sitting here like bored, obedient children. If someone was sitting at the other end of that camera feed, they would know the moment it went out. They might barely have time to get into the shaft, let alone crawl very far…

‘They could poison our air…’ Or remove it altogether. He did not know how their system worked.

‘I know.’

Well, he thought, at least she was realistic. Their odds weren’t great…but what other chance did they have?

Diggle crossed his arms over his chest and stared at the screen, considering their options. Cassie, in no hurry to die, particularly alone, kept her eyes on the grate. There was no need to rush their decision. It didn’t appear they were going anywhere any time soon.

*

Frank was the only one seated at the gazebo at the appointed hour when Jack and Torelli arrived. There were still others around, as there had been a baseball game elsewhere in the park and a firework’s show over the lake. While both had ended, the crowds were slow in clearing, groups of them as usual loitering with friends in celebration and conversation, some waiting for the glut in the parking lots to clear, some merely not wanting to go home. Any park security was spread between those two areas of the park and paid little mind to the man seated at the table alone. His coat hid whatever firepower he was packing; Jack recognized the various bulges for what they were, even if these private security officers did not.

“Where are the others?” Jack muttered, eager to get on with this.

Frank gave him a look as if to ask if Jack really expected two men in red and green to sit here in the open waiting. Frank wasn’t attracting attention. Those two certainly would have. Message received, Jack grunted, and Frank got up before either had a chance to sit.

“Come on.”

He led them towards the collection of dumpsters and scavenged trucks where he had been earlier that day, to the place where both Daredevil and Arrow crouched in the shadows of those obstacles in position to see the door of the office building. The garage was closed, and though only a single light shown in the office building, seeming to originate at the front desk, no one else had gone in or out since the security teams had begun their rounds.

Matt’s head turned at their approach and nodded when the three crouched in the shadows with them. “Find anything?”

“No one saw anything that I talked to,” Torelli muttered. “All a bust.” The night watch hadn’t seen anything out of the ordinary beyond the kids and the meth-heads, in the brief five minutes he had been allowed to question them, could only talk about the lights from the sky that had danced with them on the lake…and the ass-hat cops who had chased the lights away and ruined their celestial party.

“Same,” snorted Frank. Chatting up the mechanic had gotten him a tour of the main garage, the garden shed and other external buildings, as well as a short talk with Barbson and, as part of the front he was keeping up, an employment application because ‘one vet ought to help out another’. He hadn’t seen anywhere that hostages could be kept either. “But I did find this, Red.”

Maybe one of the others could have recognized it. Murdock, however, was the only one he truly trusted, the only one he believed could identify the small metallic item without the need for fancy lab equipment or specialists. Frank already knew what it was…he only wanted confirmation that his assessment of where it came from was right.

“Why didn’t you…?” started Oliver, but Jack’s hand clapped over his mouth as headlights approached from the north path. There was a park exit at the other end, and they waited as the vehicle continued towards it.

Oliver knew why Frank had not mentioned whatever he had found earlier. The three had scattered across the whole of the park, covering every step for details that might give them answers, reconvening only after darkness had fallen, one in red, one in green, one loaded with an arsenal that could take out a small army if it came to that.

The farther Oliver, who had taken the northernmost quadrant of the park, got from the maintenance buildings, however, the more distant the tracking beacon became. It had to have been dropped near there…or someone who had found it had to be working there. But come the end of the day, the office workers and park staff going home, the beacon remained.

Maybe it was on a desk, in a drawer. Where else, he wondered, could it be unless…

“You found it…” he hissed as soon as Jack’s hand dropped. Frank had found the tracker and had not bothered to mention it.

Matt took off one glove to better examine the lightweight bit of metal tubing Frank gave him. He gauged the diameter, the weight, the way the it was misshapen and slightly dented. Then he nodded and offered it to Jack. “Same caliber used on the bus…caught in the thick rubber treads of someone’s boots…”

Torelli’s eyes narrowed. “So they were here.”

Jack shook his head after pocketing the shell. “Only means that someone from that bus was likely here.”

“That really narrows it down…” It was more of a clue than they’d had, narrowed down a pool of suspects, Oliver knew, but it brought them little closer to finding the hostages.

“I reviewed the security tape from overnight…something odd popped up that we might want to take a look at. Delivery truck…couple of guys taking stuff in…”

“Daphne told us about…” started Torelli.

Jack glared at him for interrupting but continued, “One of them went in to the supply closet…but the footage never shows him coming out. Could have happened in the seconds between camera shifts…” It had been annoying frustrating that every time the feed shifted between the three downstairs cameras there was a few moments delay, and that while one camera feed played, the others did not. Maybe they had never had a need for ‘proper’ security cameras, but it had been bothersome enough that Jack considered teaching these people how to set up security cameras the right way. “There was lag in the feed…he could have come out between…and I didn’t have the external tape to see how many arrived in the truck…or left in it…”

“No,” Matt said, voice lowering as another set of headlights came behind them. Their position kept them hidden from the road, but each of them tensed and waited as the vehicle slowed. “Something’s in that supply room…in the wall between it and the elevator…”

“Something?” asked Oliver.

“I’d say another elevator…going down.”

Eyes turned to Jack as if expecting the government agent to have an answer to Frank’s spoken question, “Fallout shelter? Military bunker?”

“How the hell would I know?” If only he could raise Chloe, Jack might have found the answer to that question. As it was, if they were going in there, as seemed the obvious choice now, they were going in blind. “What I do know is that business card you found is…”

The headlights that had been behind them turned into the drive and stopped in a parking space near the front door. As the driver climbed out, stopped at the door, and entered a sequence on the keypad beside it, Torelli scowled. There were thousands of Land Rovers in the metropolitan areas of New York and New Jersey. Hundreds of those had to be owned and driven by blonde men. What were the odds?

What were the odds that any one of them would whistle “Bare Necessities” as he waited for the buzzer that allowed him to turn the handle and disappear inside.

The door closed. No other lights came on.

“Gotta follow him.” Torelli did not know if anyone else recognized the fellow, but as it seemed no small coincidence that his partner was here too, going in after him was a necessity that couldn’t wait. As no one else was in sight, he stood and started forward.

“I can get us in.” Perhaps some function of Oliver’s wristwatch could bypass the lock, override it, but Matt knew he could do the same, faster, he believed…and if they didn’t act fast, they were going to lose what could be their biggest lead yet.

“Go.” Gun drawn, Jack took the rear point, watching for anyone unexpected. Matt followed Torelli, who immediately tried to open the door upon reaching it, only to discover it locked.

Matt hissed, “Wait,” and then after his fingers lingered briefly over the keypad, sensing the heat signatures left upon them and the power levels connected to each, was able to put in the exact sequence of digits. The door buzzed, Torelli threw it open and charged inside; Matt caught it before it smashed Oliver in the face while Frank grabbed Torelli’s arm and yanked him to a hault.

“You wanna get killed?” They had no idea what they were walking in to, no idea how many others were in the building…and most of them had no inkling of just how well Matt’s other senses worked.

“It’s coming up…”

Gathering in the lobby now, where their silhouettes could not be seen against the front desk light through the windows, Jack pulled the door closed as quietly as he could. They could see the supply closet door from where they stood, the door Matt had tried to enter earlier that morning, but it was closed, with no one in sight. Glove pulled back on, Matt motioned for them to follow but waited at the closet door. The vibration beneath his feet, what many who worked here most likely wrote off as shaking caused by passing vehicles or some branch of the subway system they were not familiar with, stopped with a gentle shuddering behind the wall beneath Matt’s hand and was followed by another sound, another shudder, the opening of a door, a panel, that quickly engulfed the soft whistling and dragged it into the bowels of the earth. Matt waited the span of two breaths before muttering, “We’re alone.”

Oliver opened the closet door, with Frank’s automatic rifle aimed over his shoulder, but as Matt had indicated, there was no one inside. There was also, at first glance, no sign of a door, no trace of where the man who had gone into this room could have gone…except for a supply cart that had been rolled away from one the wall to their left. There were hooks upon the wall, bearing a couple of coats, a laundry bag partially full of dirty rags, and a collection of brooms and mops and long handled dusters.

“Gotta be on this wall.”

“Wait.” Matt’s hand on Oliver’s knee stayed him as he crouched. The still-wet mop head was dripping a puddle upon the floor, lukewarm water that seeped beneath the wall panel and contained a single oily footprint. The glove came off again and followed the slight airflow along that floor edge until he found the upturn of the door’s edge. Oliver, on that side, began from the top down, looking for something that would open the edge, while Jack, judging what should be the standard width of an elevator door, looked for the other edge.

Frank snorted. “You guys never watched a movie?” he asked, reaching over Matt’s head to pull down on the hooks one after another…until the wall panel creaked and slid to the right, fitting easily behind the metal cabinet beside it.

They were met with an empty shaft.

“How do we call it?”

“We’re not,” Jack replied to Torelli’s question. He’d come across more than one hidden bunker in his days at CTU. Odds were the elevator’s rest position was at the bottom, that it only came to this surface room when called, and that elevator calls were monitored. Calling it would announce their arrival to someone before they were ready to make their presence known.

“You have an idea what we’ll find down there?” Oliver hadn’t forgotten Jack’s almost revelation about the business card they had found on the bus.

“Medical research group…mostly civilian grade…but a lot of top secret military grade research…”

Oliver nodded. “Makes sense…medical convention…lottery to show off some big development…”

“Or to recruit test subjects.” Frank growled as he said it, the thought of Karen being used as a test subject for some sort of military experiment making his blood boil.

No happier with the thought, Matt put the glove back on and was the first to climb into the shaft. There were wires, metal rungs, the heavy elevator cable and the tracks upon which it moved, all of which could be used to descend. He could not gauge the depth as the elevator car was still moving in the darkness, but it was going to be a long way down.

“So soldiers…doctors…scientists…patients…” he murmured.

“We watch out for guns and syringes…and anything else that might make a weapon,” Jack agreed. “Everyone in…but quietly…”

“And no killing…”

Frank rolled his eyes. “Red…” he muttered with exasperation.

“Let’s wait until we get there before we start making plans…” said Jack from above.

Matt, already descending, blocked the passage. “No killing.” Not all of these people would be military. Not all of them could be criminals. None of them, in his opinion, deserved to die.

If they had hurt Karen, however, that might turn into a different story.

Jack growled, turned on a flashlight feature on his cellphone, and holding it between his teeth so that the light shown down into the shaft, started down the shaft. “No killing,” he mumbled in agreement. If anyone had harmed Cassie, however, that promise would never stand.

*

Decision made, Diggle stood with a stretch and began to pace the room, his steps slow and steady, his actions appearing no more than a relief of boredom and the stiffness of sitting too long. Others in the room watched him at first, but after the first several passes even that grew boring, and so they returned to whatever they had been doing to pass the time. Karen, toying with her hair, untangling it, braiding it, smoothing it again, nervous actions that kept her hands busy as she ran the details of these events over and over in her mind, committing them to memory to be written later…once she was free of here. Dr. Alvarez, his head bowed, seemed to be praying, only occasionally lifting his head to glance towards the monitor or one of the others before dropping again with a look of despair in his dark eyes. Donna, the gray eyed woman, continued to mutter and squirm, complaining about needing food, needing a bathroom, needing a drink but afraid to drink any more.

Not even Hunter’s sharp remark telling her to shut up had worked.

He still appeared to be attempting to sleep upon the floor with his hands nested behind his head, and that was where he was when Diggle’s foot sharply caught his elbow. He opened his eyes, prepared with a snarling retort, but Diggle’s position meant that Hunter’s gaze first met Cassie’s, and a flick of her eyes drew his attention to the hand hanging at side.

Get ready to pull the grate free, the hand signals said. Be ready to help get them out.

He gave Diggle an annoyed glare, partially to express his feeling about the not so accidental kick and partially to gauge what the man was doing. He and Cassie had a plan. What it was, he could not tell, but he knew he’d recognize it when it came. Then he looked up at the grate as he stretched, a seemingly causal glance that turned into a blank stare as he laced his fingers behind his head again. There were no visible screws, and the mineral fiber ceiling tiles designed to contain the noise levels throughout the complex looked like they would be easy to break. Provided there were no screws inside the shaft, pulling the grate free ought to be an easy job.

Getting Donna up there, however, if that was the plan, was going to be a more challenging task.

Hand in his pocket, fist curled around the arrowhead, John nodded at Cassie. Seven more steps would bring him to the television. Seven more steps and they could act.

Cassie gestured out of sight to Hunter.

Hunter sat up and absently scratched at his ankle.

Diggle took four of the seven steps.

Then the door handled jiggled, twisted, and Dr. Mazur opened the door with an apologetic yet bored and, to Cassie, stressed expression upon his face.

“Thank God!” Donna exclaimed. “Where is the bathroom?”

“Apologies for the delay…please…right this way…”

“What’s going on? Where have you…?” started Karen.

“Please…there is no time to delay…”

Donna stomped up to him and glowered into his face. “There damn well better be time. I need to pee.”

It appeared that the Doctor was about to say something inappropriate or at least unkind, but Dr. Alvarez reached the woman’s side and, with one hand on the woman’s back and another gently upon her arm, he turned on the charm that Karen had seen hints of upon their first meeting. “I’m sure there will be a chance to use the toilet,” he said warmly.

That warmth, however, never made it to his eyes.

“We’d better,” Donna snapped. But Dr. Alvarez’s charisma had worked well enough to ease her annoyance. The two of them were the first out of the room, followed by Hunter and Karen, and finally John and Cassie. Hunter looked back over his shoulder and shrugged.

So much for that attempt at escape.

*

Matt had finally reached the top of the elevator car, some eighty feet beneath the ground by his judgement. He listened as he waited for the others to join him, the sounds of water in pipes, the rush of recirculated air, the electric hum of power racing through tightly woven conduit, each sound webbing out from some central point, feeding a complex labyrinth of corridors and rooms. From his perch upon the elevator car, he could not tell how many rooms, or how many people there might be, but it was a bigger complex then he had expected it to be. How, he wondered as Frank stopped beside him and Oliver stopped on the other, were they going to find Karen and the others in this?

Frank found the latch on the repair hatch, and opened the now empty elevator. It had been idle for nearly five minutes now, leaving them no clue as to where the man they had been following could have gone.

“We could sure use the cover of darkness now,” muttered Torelli.

“You can see in the dark?” Jack asked, breathless, like Torelli, from the climb. This was the most physical exertion he’d been through since Russia. He was sure his doctors would have warned him against this.

“No,” Frank replied instead, drawing a pair of night goggles from the inside pocket of his coat, “but neither can they…and we have Red.”

Matt smirked. “One vote of confidence…”

Oliver studied some of the thick bundles of wire running through the shaft they were in. “If we cut some of these…it might disrupt the power enough to give us some darkness…”

“And bring them to us instead of us going to them.” Jack liked that plan. Standing their ground instead of opening themselves up for possible ambushes from unfamiliar rooms and corridors was a wiser tactical choice.

“We’ll be surrounded…there’s three corridors from here…”

“So we split up…head off anyone coming…watch each other’s backs.” Despite the tensions between personalities in the group, Jack believed that, when it came down to a fight, they could depend on each other.

“I work alone…” snarled Frank. So too, he knew did Murdock. Obviously, one of them was going to have to give in and buddy up, but there was no way in hell Frank was going anywhere with Oliver Queen.

Matt scowled. Frank working alone meant people dying, regardless of what Frank had promised, but they could not argue about it now. “Then Arrow’s with me,” he decided, making the choice for Jack and Torelli but assuming the two men, familiar with one another and of similar training, would feel more comfortable together than split up.

He also did not particularly trust Torelli yet. That man knew something about his death. Who was to say that he’d not had a hand in it?

Dropping down through the hatch, Frank grunted, “I’ll get the door…you get power, Archer.” It sounded a lot better than calling the man Green and a lot less pretentious than calling him Arrow.

No audible alarm sounded when he pressed the button and the elevator opened to bright, sterile white corridors. He, Jack and Torelli squinted against the brightness after the climb in the mostly dark shaft, but the brightness was cut short by the flowering shower of sparks rained down upon them when three of Oliver’s metal tipped arrows sliced through the thickest three cables he could see.

One corridor when completely dark. The lights in the others went from dark to the dim glow of emergency lighting.

“Frank…that way.” He had the night vision glasses…and Oliver didn’t know yet how well Oliver might fight in total darkness. Jack and Torelli were already moving down the corridor to the right, guns ready. “And Frank…”

“I know, I know…no killing,” Frank muttered.

Side by side, Matt and Oliver took the central corridor, Matt wondering if he should have given that same reminder to the officer and the agent.


	12. 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay; real life has been running interference, but I've got the last of it for you all now. Thanks for bearing with me.

After a brief restroom stop, made, Karen believed, so that Dr. Mazur did not have to listen to Donna’s continual whining, they were issued into a large two-tiered room without windows. The sounds below, beeps and whirrs and buzzings, sucking sounds and the rhythmic rise and fall of air compressor units reminded her of those one would hear on any number of hospital shows. Whatever was below, however, some six feet beneath them, was hidden in the center of the room by sterile white curtains upon gleaming silver rails, held by metal loops that rattled when the curtains were disturbed by the movement behind them. The fabric was too thick, the position of the lighting just right, to disallow shadows, but the curtains did not touch the floor, and in the six or eight empty inches, silent shoes covered with the same sterile paper slippers that every guest wore were the only other indication of something hidden. Dark blue and light blue, signifying top staff from lesser staff, with most they could see wearing light blue. The six of them had been given sterile masks and made to put them on before entering.

She met Cassie’s gaze. In another life, they might have been friends. Maybe after this was open, they still could be. Right now, friendships weren’t high on the list of anyone’s priorities.

“Surgical theatre,” Cassie whispered. As part of her military medical training, she’d attended a number of such surgeries, watching from an elevated position instead of being on hand and under foot. Yes, witnessing such events on a monitor allowed for closer inspection of details, but there was something to be said about exposure to the sight, the smell of blood, of open body cavities, and if anyone intending to enter the medical field could not stomach those things, it was better that they rethink their convictions early on instead of wasting anyone’s time.

Donna scowled. “I didn’t sign on to watch a surgery.” She sounded as if she would be sick and the eyes of four of the other five turned towards her as if to ask what she had been doing at a medical convention if she had no stomach for it.

Maybe she was a paper-pusher, nothing more, an administrator or some company’s purchasing agent.

Dr. Mazur was below, speaking now to an orderly in light blue and someone in a white lab coat different from the others at the panel on the other side of the room. The orderly, a bulky man whose features suggested familiarity between the blisters and scars he wore, trudged up the stairs where the group had come up to the balcony. He approached Dr. Alvarez who stood at the end next to Karen, and closed his gloved fist around the man’s arm. His hands were big, long fingered, easily encircling Alvarez’s bicep. He muttered something that might have been ‘come’ but whatever incident had damaged his face, his throat, his lips, seemed to have affected his voice as well, for the sound was little more than a grunt. The meaning, however, was clear.

“Where are you taking him?” Karen began to protest, grabbing Alvarez’s other arm, trying not to gag at the stench of whatever pus or medicinal treatment was applied to the orderly. Oddly, he was the only one they had seen not wearing a mask; judging by the condition of his skin, it seemed likely that any mask would have stuck to his skin.

What Hunter wanted to know was why the hell was the guy was working instead of laid up on a hospital bed being treated for what was seemingly a very serious condition.

“Karen…” The silver-haired doctor put his hand gently upon hers, a gesture which pried hers loose of his arm. He knew there was no use in resisting. It had only been a matter of time before his efforts were discovered. Those with the money behind the research and development here couldn’t take the risk now that they were aware of the threat he represented.

Alvarez’s voice was undercut by the sound of metal rings pulled across the metal poles, the drawing back of the curtains around thirteen beds, twelve occupants strapped there, tapped into monitoring equipment and an array of IV tubes, faces hidden behind metallic masks with wires and tubes and diodes protruding from them, the thirteenth bed empty and waiting for the volunteer who was to occupy it.

There was barely time to take in any of that imagery, however, before every light in the room, save for the array of diodes and LEDs and digital numbers on the medical equipment across the room. A split moment of silence, registered only by Cassie’s Sentinel senses, heard the shutting down of IVs, of breathing tubes, before the twelve upon the tables began to thrash and the cluster of medical staff rushed to their aid.

*

Sure he’d worn the night vision goggles before in his days as a soldier, but Frank wasn’t fond of them. He wasn’t fond of anything that hampered his natural senses, and there was some argument about whether the image created in the goggles was natural or not. He had brought them on the off chance they’d be useful…and he wouldn’t have to use them at all if he’d chosen to wade into this kiddy pool of medical mayhem with Oliver Queen. Murdock could have handled this dark corridor, and whatever awaited him, on his own. But Frank just couldn’t get past it…something about Oliver rubbed him the wrong way. Maybe his wealth, maybe the playboy attitude he’d heard the man had. Maybe they’d fought against one another in a past life. It was enough to keep them always slightly at odds, no matter how much he might actually trust Queen to do this job and do it right.

At the moment it was the irritating fact that, in truth, he’d rather be doing this job alone…or at most with Red…that continued to chafe at him and tried to distract his focus.

Fortunately, screaming and the sounds of fists banging on shatter-proof glass brought his full focus back. Pistols at the ready, he counted seven individuals in what appeared to be a library or reading room behind a locked door. “Stand back,” he shouted. But those inside, screaming for their freedom, did not hear him. He raised a hand to wave them back, when footsteps came from further ahead, around a corner, and Frank had barely enough time to get clear as a barrage of gunfire erupted. Three shooters, with weaponry that from the sound of it was not firing bullets but rather tranquilizer darts, one of which struck one of his guns and knocked it from his hand.

So they thought they were contending with some out of control patient or maybe even some escaped experiment if what Bauer stated was accurate. Frank dropped, scooped up the fallen pistol as he rolled, and came up firing three shots in succession, each one of them taking an adversary off his feet with bullets to the knees. Not killing them, as he’d promised. He scrambled to his feet, shot the door handle off the door to set the trapped people free, and then hit or kicked each of the three shooters in the head hard enough to knock them out.

“You’d better appreciate this, Red,” he muttered. Could never be sure how long a man would stay down this way, how long before they were in pursuit again, but as they were probably just men doing their jobs, men not trying to kill him, or anyone else as far as he knew, giving Murdock this concession wasn’t a difficult decision to make.

The fellow who struck him across the back with a chair, however, was less fortunate. Reflex drew the next shot, one that grazed the assailant’s throat. Surprised, the man stumbled back, tripped over the dropped chair and hit his head against the wall as he fell. He was bleeding, but wouldn’t likely bleed to death if someone got to him sooner rather than later.

The others from the room stared at Frank in shock and fear.

“Get out of here,” he barked at the collection wearing white, lavender or yellow robes or pajamas. “Somewhere safe…or better yet, leave this place…”

“Exit’s that way…” said a shaky voiced Asian man with white hair but smooth, unwrinkled skin. He eyed the guns in Frank’s hands but seemed less afraid of him then he was of his living situation. “Let us come with you…we don’t want to stay here…they’ll take us…we ‘ll never make it out ourselves…”

The way he was heading…and obviously frightened. They all were. Frank rolled his eyes and growled, “Great.” That meant he was going to have to play babysitter, to get these people to safety. Leaving them behind to fend for themselves wasn’t an option. They’d come to perform a rescue; shouldn’t that include those already here…possibly victims of previous abductions? “Just stay behind me…and stay out of my way.” Heads bobbed in emphatic agreement, each one eager to do whatever Frank said to be free. “You,” Frank gestured to the Asian man. “There were some people brought in…a…big group…” He had no idea what else to call them. They might have been given a tour, since they’d won that stupid lottery thing, or they might have been immediately to some sort of holding facility.

“The tour…yes…they were taken this way…” Again he pointed, and Frank almost smiled. Well, at least they were all going in the same direction. Provided the corridors didn’t branch too much, he just might find them.

“Let’s move it…”

*

Stealth was more difficult in the harsh glare of fluorescent lighting, and keeping their weapons at the ready without looking like they were intending to kill anyone they might come across was nearly impossible. So far they had not crossed paths with anyone, nor seen a single door or window, so it was hard to say what they were up against. They hoped to pass as staff, until the sound of approaching footsteps gave them the opportunity to witness a group of individuals with tools heading through a corridor intersection, presumably to repair the source of the power outage. All of them wore hospital scrubs of pale gray, and a few, who broke off from that group and entered a room ahead of them, wore deep blue. Bidding Torelli to stay back, Jack crept around the corner where they hid in order to spy through the plate glass window. It did not take him long to scurry back to Torelli’s side.

“Cafeteria…two dozen at least…all in blue or white.”

“Feeding time at the zoo,” Torelli muttered. “At this hour?” Didn’t they have any idea what the hour was? Or maybe they were the night shift crew on their lunch break. That made more sense. How do we get past?”

“We stay low…and pray.” They could crouch their way beneath the window, remaining out of sight of those within, and might be able to duck past the open door, but avoiding anyone going into, or out of, the room was going to be impossible.

It was challenge it seemed they might pass until one pair of female staff workers came out of the cafeteria and turned down the corridor away from them, continuing their conversation as they reached the intersection. Jack and Torelli remained still, waiting for the hall to be empty again before proceeding, listening as they did for the sound of anyone within coming to the door. But the threat they suddenly faced was not from within, but rather the women themselves, stopping to speak in warm greetings to three men also in light blue who joined them there. It was the three men who spotted the intruders and as one shouted, “Hey! You there!” and another drew out what appeared to be a cell phone, Jack charged them, intending to prevent any call for help.

Torelli, meanwhile blocked the cafeteria doorway, gun aimed inside with a sharp, “Don’t anyone move!”

One of the women and one of the men squawked in fear and froze. Surprised, and inexperienced in the manner of combat in which Jack had been trained, his quick punches knocked out both the man with the phone and the one who had shouted at them and the second woman, after looking as though she intended to fight back, thought better of it and stood down.

“Into the cafeteria…all of you.” Those three who were not incapacitated dragged the other two, quaking with fear, until they were inside the room with the others. 

Torelli looked the group over before speaking. “We’re looking for a group of people brought in sometime last night. Anyone know anything?”

Heads shook no. While some of them could be lying, to Jack they look too frightened to be able to hide the truth. Odds were, as Murdock said, most of those here wouldn’t have any idea of the secrets at the top of their power pyramid. He pulled Torelli into the corridor, drew the door closed behind them, and fired at the handle, disabling it so that no one was easily going to be coming out after them. Being a kitchen, maybe there was a back door, a secondary entrance meant for the delivery of food and supplies, but Jack had to hope that was not the case. He motioned for Torelli to follow, leaving those trapped in the cafeteria to bang on the door and window in an effort to break free.

He pointed left. Right was going to take them along the side of the cafeteria. Perhaps it would have revealed a back door and allowed them to block it too, but that, they both agreed, would be wasting time. The hostages weren’t going to find themselves. Besides, the repair crew had gone this way. Perhaps there was some sort of control room there, and something in that room that might tell them where the hostages had been taken.

*

It was the best chance they were going to get. Diggle did not have to say it for Hunter and Cassie to seize the opportunity. The closest to Alvarez’s attendant, Diggle shoved the man backwards and was shocked to find the man stronger and more sure-footed then he had believed. It was enough to free the doctor, however, and Karen grabbed his hand and ran for the stairs right behind Hunter.

Cassie took the easy way down, leaping over the balcony rail to land on her feet in a crouched position, a very feline gesture. One of the staff grabbed the nearest object, a surgical tray of instruments, and rushed at her, sending the tools upon it clattering across the floor.

“Get that power back on!” Doctor Kozlov shouted. Someone rushed the door, but with the power out, the safety lock had engaged and the door refused to open. Kozlov noted this as soon as he spoke, and though his priority was his subjects, the company priority was his life, his knowledge. It was the only reason, with the subsequent failure of the communication system, that he allowed Mazur and a few others to push him back from the beds into the only door in the room that would open.

The turning of a latch behind them, however, meant that no one else could follow Kozlov, Mazur, Rushing and the other unidentified doctor out of the room. The orderlies and ‘guests’ were trapped along with the unfortunate souls strapped to the uncushioned tables they lay upon.

Four of those upon the tables had ripped through the straps that held their limbs down, only to discover as they tried to rise that they were caught in place by the masks. As Cassie and Hunter fought off the attendants, some of whom attacked while others hastily administered injections to some of their test subjects, and Diggle continued to fight the now enraged orderly on the balcony, Karen left Alvarez to aid the stumbling, screaming Donna on the stairs. Dodging thrown objects and the surprising skilled punches thrown by the medical staff, Karen grabbed at the mask of the first person she reached and tried to find some means of opening it, a latch, a lock, a screw. Her proximity seemed to further anger the trapped fellow, as he howled and began to swing and kick at her.

“Don’t…Karen…there is nothing you can…”

*

Even Oliver could hear the bellowings of fury and suffering through whatever closed door lay along the path they were running. They had already left behind them one collection of unconscious, incapacitated bodies of men and women armed not with weapons but with tranquilizers meant to disable a problem without permanent harm. It was what Matt expected to find in a medical facility. The combination of arrows and sticks and fists would keep any of that first security detail from pursuing them but from the sounds ahead of them, it sounded like more security officers would soon be on their way. Those cries were not the sort that should be heard in a medical facility however, but rather ones expected on a field of combat.

It was the one name said beneath the screams and two distant cracks of gunfire, masked from normal hearing but not from Matt’s sensitive ears brought him up short with his head cocked to the side. The name was not repeated, no one replied beyond the continued chaos of fighting and shrieking, but Matt knew.

Oliver turned when he realized Matt had stopped, but Matt just as quickly began to run again. “This way…she’s here...” Oliver didn’t ask who, he just followed the sounds of combat and Murdock’s sure trajectory.

Matt didn’t have to hear more. He already knew.

*

Alvarez reached for Karen, to pull her back, having left Donna cowring in the corner by the door, but he was quickly engaged by a glassy eyed orderly wielding a scalpel. The man on the bed suddenly lurched to his feet, the bolts that had held the mask to his bed breaking free beneath his strength. The abruptness of his action shoved Karen backwards, into Alvarez who was thus pushed out of the line of his attacker’s swing. Only Cassie’s kick kept that scalpel from slashing Karen’s face as it spun the man sideways into the console, creating a shower of sparks, electrical pops, and cracking plastic components.

The last two individuals bound to the beds who had not already grown still began to screech in agony, a sound mirrored by both Karen and Donna as the once bound fellow’s mask clattered to the tiled floor. The veins on his face and neck bulged, the muscles beneath his skin rippled as if infested by a swarm of parasites, his eyes, bloodshot and yellow tinged, protruded in their sockets and he staggered and stumbled like a man intoxicated and blind. He picked up the bed in one hand and threw it in his rage. It caught the falling body of the blistered face man whom Diggle had just thrown over the balcony in a desperate effort to be free of him, and both body and bed struck the door with enough force to elicit a crack.

Whether he understood, in his delirious state, what that sound meant, or he was drawn to the sound for some other reason, the monstrous thing charged the door. It splintered off its hinges, throwing the entire door across the hall. The roar, either of rage or pain or both filled the room and followed him down the corridor.

*

Room after empty room, all with the appearance of staff quarters or leisure rooms not used during the work shifts, suggested that Jack and Torelli had come down the most unproductive corridor imaginable. They had heard an exchange of gunfire, heard the roar of some wounded beast or frightfully hideous monster, but the echoes were muffled by the thickness of walls and the twists of corridors, and so it was impossible to tell where the sounds originated. The exchange of gunfire had to be Frank, as the other two men carried no guns. Other than an exchange of glances as they reached another T intersection, there was nothing Jack and Torelli could do. Frank was on his own.

“I say we go this way this time,” Torelli said, thumbing to the right.

“Sticking left will eventually link us up to the others,” argued Jack.

“We’re leaving a whole section uninvestigated…and you can see what going always left has gotten us so far…totally squat.”

Jack couldn’t argue those points, but he still did not like to deviate from the path he’d set for them. They could split up, but he felt that their chances for survival were higher if they stayed together. He glanced down the corridor to his left, sighed, and then nodded. Right. They might as well. Maybe it would throw off any pursuers they might have picked up along the way. Jack would feel a lot better if they had a map., if Chloe would reach out to him and tell him where the hell he was going.

He hated flying blind.

*

“Was that…?” started Hunter. With the medical staff subdued now, they were momentarily out of danger, although Donna’s continued screaming was going to bring trouble before long. Cassie crouched beside her, her hand over the woman’s mouth, trying to still and calm her.

“No time to debate…we’ve gotta go. Doctor?” Diggle asked.

Karen pointed at the still thrashing and squealing victims on their beds. “We can’t just leave them…”

“Nothing we can do for them,” Alvarez said with thick dismay and regret in his voice. He looked around the floor at the scattered instruments and objects there, but what had once been filled syringes were now, if not already injected into the subjects, smashed and useless, their contents spilled upon the floor. He saw only one other option. “The process did not finish…they are beyond our help…”

The long metal object he located was held over the body of the first and driven with precision into the individual’s heart. The body stiffened in shock and almost at once went limp.

“What are you doing?” screamed Karen. She tried to grab his arm but Alvarez eluded her hands and Diggle held her back.

“Sounds like you’ve been part of this all along,” Hunter challenged bitterly at the same time.

“Mercy killing,” Diggle mumbled, understanding it. A quick death was certainly better than untold hours, or even minutes, of agony. If Alvarez had any inkling of what had been done to them, he would be the best one to know what chance for survival they had. If that thing that had broken free and escaped into the corridor was indicative of the condition either of these two were in, death was likely a far better outcome for them. The doctor likewise stilled the second victim, so that all eleven upon their beds now lay still.

“We don’t have time.” Pulling Donna to her feet, the woman now blindly compliant in her shock, Cassie nodded at the doctor. What exactly his part was in this mayhem was best sorted out later. Doctor Alvarez appeared genuinely remorseful and he was their best home at escaping alive. “Can you get us out of here?”

“I believe so…I will try.” They stepped into the corridor, Diggle leading the way to clear it for the others. The shattered door broken in two against the opposite wall was smeared with blood and other bodily fluids where the other had rammed into it and left a sticky wet trail on the floor in its wake. Alvarez sighed forlornly and turned the others to the left, in the opposite direction. Whether he would succeed in getting them out or not depended on what they might find in these corridors outside.

*

The thing might have been a man. Despite its abnormal size, it’s misshapen form, the straining elevated heart rate that thundered both louder, harder, and faster than it should, the deep rapid breathing that better fitted a running horse, and the constant roar and howl of a thing in agony, it should have been a man. Matt’s ears told him the same thing Oliver’s eyes told him when the monstrosity erupted around the distant corner. It ran blindly, driven by pain and rage more than anything else, but was it detected men in its path, it charged them, leaving by hind a slippery trail of blood and some other bodily fluid that oozed from wounds upon one arm and seemly from every other pore an orifice. Oliver drew back the bow.

“Don’t kill it…” Any man suffering that much did not deserve to die for its uncontrollable actions.

The arrow was already loosed. “Can at least slow it down…”

But the arrow in its leg did nothing except make it bellow more loudly. It’s steps did not falter, almost as if the arrow had been a fly, nothing more. It reached Oliver and swept him aside with one thick, close-fisted arm while it reached for Matt with the other.

The impact of Matt’s fist into its nose had no effect other than snapping its head back. To Matt, it felt like hitting the gym bag, the same consistency, the same resistance, and the same reaction the inanimate object would have had. Swing back, then return, unaffected and uncaring. Matt dropped, missed being thrown by its punch by inches, and slid between its bowing legs as Oliver, having gotten to his feet, threw one of the two blades he had on him.

It caught the beast in the lower back, resulting in a spray of that strange mix of blood and a clearer, yellow tinted fluid as it turned back around to face them.

In the corridor from where it had emerged, several pairs of running footsteps added to the din. “Ol…” started one familiar voice.

Matt ducked again and Oliver was mid back jump when the voice came.

There had been misgivings about running in the direction of that dangerous thing that had given them freedom in its rage, but Doctor Alvarez assured them it was the only way to go if they wanted a chance to escape. They heard the fight, and each assumed, including Alvarez, that facility staff had found the escaped creature and were trying to subdue it in the side corridor it had taken. As Alvarez’ gesture indicated they were to continue running straight ahead, they had to hope that the staff would be too occupied with their creation to notice them passing.

No one expected a pair of men, one in deep green, one in red and black, pitted against a thing of nightmares.

Fortunately, John caught himself mid word. “All of you…keep going…” He turned as if to charge headlong into the fight.

“Get back,” shouted Oliver, noting that not one but three of the group were hesitating as if to join their fight.

Diggle’s nearly voiced protest, and his attempt to block the two behind him from rushing past him, was aborted by Karen’s scream of “Behind you!” as Matt was shoved into Oliver, knocking him off his feet.

The beast now had multiple targets, some vaguely recognized from the room of its ‘birth’, and it decided that they were more favorable targets then the two pesky ones that kept fighting back.

“I’ve got this,” Matt shouted, flipping to his feet with a sideways motion that tripped their opponent and caused its great bulk to thunder to the floor with further splattering of fluid and a loud expulsion of air. “Get them out of here!”

Oliver didn’t ask for reassurance. Even if the two behind John were soldiers by nature and training, none of them were armed. None of them stood a chance against this thing. Matt, at least, if he could find its weakness…assuming it had one…could survive this.

“We can get out this way…”

That voice.

It reverberated in Matt’s skull, for a moment drowning the labored breathing and soggy scrambling of the thing trying to push back to its feet upon a slippery floor. He knew that voice. Somewhere in a place of buried memories, that voice existed…like the voice of God himself.

But how?

The thing’s attempt to rise resulted in a launch forward down the corridor like a ball in its bowling lane. John grabbed Oliver, pulled him back in his own retreat, only barely avoiding knocking over Cassie and Hunter behind him. Oliver herded them back in the direction the older man indicated, with only a glance over his shoulder at Matt who had now pounced on the thing’s broad, bulging, discolored back and was attempting to wrap one arm around its thick neck.

Rendering it unconscious might be the best option they had.

But the monster’s ragged breathing, the labored struggle of its heart as it tried to maintain a life-sustaining rhythm for a body whose demand for oxygen and energy was greater than its enlarged organs could meet. Struggle nor no, it would be a matter of time before the mutated body lost its battle with itself and imploded. It smelled of decay and heat, of a host of chemical chain reactions that were leading towards an inevitable end. All that Matt needed to do, as a large hand reached behind its back, grabbed hold of him, and threw him down the corridor, over its head, like a cloth doll, was occupy it long enough to give Oliver and the others the chance to escape.

“I can help you…”

But it was a lie, and he knew it. He had no training, no technology that could reverse the impending failure of organ systems, and even if he could get the poor man…no thing in Matt’s eyes, but a man…to some sort of medical assistance, it was too late for that. Five minutes. Ten. Maybe thirty at most if he quit fighting against himself.

Both rose into crouched positions, narrowed eyes of one seeming to assess the situation for the first time. Or maybe, Matt thought, listening to the hitch in the large man’s breathing, some small sliver of his humanity was attempting to surface. Heavier footsteps ran towards them from behind his opponent’s broad back, men with same sort of tranquilizing guns as those Matt and Oliver had previously encountered. Guns aimed…ready…

The massive man-thing, its flesh sagging and dripping more now as even his skin failed around the deteriorating muscles and organs beneath it, rose up to its full height and width. Whether the shots of the eight behind him were intending to shoot him, or Matt, his bulk caught each dart. As with Oliver’s arrow and knife, and Matt’s punch, the prick of darts were barely felt, the agent they contained not enough, even in that first round of eight shots, to tranquilize him. He uttered something, maybe a sound of pain, maybe an apology…and maybe, as Matt heard it, the command to run, to join the others.

Eight more shots. He was beginning to stagger, to sway, his systems slowing quickly now that the fight had been given up, now that the tranquilizers were doing their job. He couldn’t hold the security men forever, and there was nothing Matt could do for him. Even stopping the eight assailants was not going to help.

At least as long as they dealt with their experiment…which was Matt believed the fellow was…they would be too busy to pursue Oliver, Karen, and the others. And if they did…well, they would have to get through Matt first.

*

Their path to the right, following Torelli’s suggestion this time, dead ended in a cul-de-sac of glass windows and a door locked with a keypad, behind which rows of bubbling test tubes, boxes with more lights and wires coming from then then Torelli had ever seen, walls of computers and a host of monitoring equipment, like something out of one of the mad scientist movies that Simpson was so fond of and had made Torelli watch with him whenever the two had deemed it movie and beer night.

How ironic, the cop thought with a scowl

Along the back wall, a half dozen units that Jack recognized, new models then the one at Tigh Ard, All six were closed, though lights and digital numbers moving across their front panels suggested they weren’t empty, and the six padded tables nearby, beds perhaps, were empty save for freshly pressed clothing in similar colors to what they had already seen: lavender, yellow and white…clothing he suspected would soon be worn by whomever emerged from those units.

The thought of what might be happening enveloped him with a cold shudder. He didn’t know where other clones were created, under what conditions. He knew a few who claimed to escape such facilities, but he’d chosen to believe those were the odd ones, that most came from facilities like Max’s ‘kitchen’. This reality was a darker one than he had ever actively contemplated.

It was a short-lived feeling, however, as those within the lab saw the two plain-clothed strangers. A few picked up what looked to be some sort of tranquiller guns, different than those they had already seen. The doors swung open outwards on quiet pneumatic hinges, and neither Jack nor Torelli hesitated in taking their own shots before those within could do so.

Jack’s shot clipped one shooter’s shoulder, causing his shot to go wild, clip the fluorescent lighting units above, and produce a shower of glaring orange sparks. Torelli’s shot struck a metal canister of some sort of pressurized substance; the contents sprayed into the room, and when the sparks and the substance came into contact, a flare of yellow flame burst forth, the fire of it rushing back along the spray to the tank to produce a thunderous explosion.

People screamed. The lab doors began to close in response to the wailing alarm and the spray of water and foam now blasting from the fire suppression units in the ceiling. The combination of water, retardant, and the gas from the ruptured tank was creating an oily film on the windows and other surfaces, a film that easily caught fire with a flame of such intensity that the windows began to crack and melt until tiny spits of flame were licking into the air in the cul-de-sac, filling the air with the noxious combination of burning chemicals and burning flesh. A door at the mouth of the cul-de-sac, that neither Jack nor Torelli had realized was there, began to close.

Jack grabbed Torelli’s arm and yanked him just before glass shattered and the burning oily substance sprayed over every surface in the cul-de-sac.

They barely made it through before the door closed.

“We should do something…”

“We are doing something,” Jack snapped, running now in the other direction as fast as he could. He imagined there were people stationed in this place whose job it was to contain such fires, and he would rather not have to shoot through them in order to make his escape. If that fire could not be stopped, contained, a whole lot more than a dozen or so scientists and unformed clones were going to die. He could not afford to feel guilty now.

If anything, Jack focused on the hell he had probably saved those still forming clones from and trying to outrun the smoke creeping under the closed door behind them. That smoke alone would probably kill them.

They reached the intersection they had been at previously, hearing a horde of feet running from the direction of the cafeteria.

“We go this way.” Jack continued straight ahead, into the corridor he had wanted to take to begin with.

Torelli didn’t protest. He was too busy trying to burn away the stench of burning bodies from his nose as he ran and thanking God that he had not been caught in there to burn with the rest of those unfortunate souls.

*

A waiting room? Seriously?

Frank had avoided the elevator they’d passed, not wanting to waste time by getting trapped in a metal box that someone else could control. As they were beneath the ground, anything that went up was probably something they wanted to take, and so he herded those he had rescued into the stairwell and told them to go up. They were met by shouts and gunfire from somewhere above, and after making sure his ragtag group was out of the stairwell, Frank shot back. Some tumbled down the stairs, some fell over the rails, some merely screamed and fell silent.

To hell with no killing. They shot at him first…and he had lives to protect. He was a soldier, damn it. That’s what soldiers did.

He’d already pocketed the goggles when his dark corridor gave way to one lit by the dim glow of emergency lighting. This room too was only partially lit, the lights above them dark but the lights low along the floor flickering in response to the unsteady source that powered them.

More gunfire and shouts came from the direction they had come from. Caught between two groups, they found themselves herded into this tiny alcove, a waiting room or lobby, Frank wasn’t sure, with doors left and right. He was pretty sure there were shouts coming from beyond them as well. Surrounded on three sides, they were all going to be gunned down if he didn’t do something fast.

“Any of you shoot?”

A strong looking fellow with a military haircut raised his hand. He hadn’t said a word thus far, made no sound, and Frank had figured out several corridors ago that the man did not speak English. Now he said, “Shoot,” and gestured for one of Frank’s guns.

Figures it would be the only word he understood.

Shooting off the handle of the right door, so that no one would be able to easily pass through it, Frank handed one of his handguns to the stranger and tossed him another clip. He pointed at the left door and said, “Anything comes through that door…shoot it.”

At this point he didn’t care what that something might be. Whoever it was, was not likely to be on their side. Better to shoot first and ask questions later. With the other refugees huddled to the left side of the room, hopefully out of range of gunfire, his back to his newfound ally’s, they began shooting as one the moment those two doors crashed open.

Frank hoped there wouldn’t be many. He had additional rounds, but his supply wasn’t unlimited. Sooner or later, it would run out. Then it would be down to fists against guns…and he wasn’t sure his new partner, as strong as he was, could win in a fight like that.

*

“Come on…all of you…come with us…”

Doctor Alvarez’s path had brought the group into a familiar corridor, familiar because Cassie recognized the windows with their drawn blinds, the windows behind which a number of clones were held, strapped to beds by buckles and IV’s and their own weak physical conditions. Cassie’s demand that they rescue those they could from the other side of the locked door was met with general agreement from the others, including Alvarez who, by pressing his palm to the flat panel next to the door was able to prove that he had, indeed, been here before…recently enough to still have security clearance. It made Hunter suspicious, more so than the others at least. He remained at the door, smelling a trap in the doctor getting the entire group of them into a room with no other entrance or exit, and Oliver remained there with him, bow at the ready, watching up and down the corridor after a quick glance of assessment at those in the room the redhead wanted to save.

Seventeen in all, but most would not wake, or woke only enough to groggily mutter something before succumbing back into their drug induced state. Four of the remaining six were maneuvered onto their feet, including the man Cassie had locked eyes with earlier. Though wobbly and slightly disoriented, they were able to walk unaided. Alvarez wrapped an army around one of the other two who was having a more difficult time finding his bearings, and Karen helped the remaining woman whose legs were having a more difficult time bearing her weight.

Oliver and John scowled at each other. Such a burden would slow them down, but they agreed these people could not be left to whatever fate awaited them strapped down to those beds. Oliver may not have seen the extent of what was being done here, but John had, and after the forced abduction, Oliver knew enough to trust John’s assessment.

Hearing running footsteps, Hunter snatched one of Oliver’s knives and aimed, prepared not to be caught off guard. Fortunately he saw, in the same moment Oliver did, the slime covered Devil emerge from the semi-darkness of the distant corridor.

“Glad you caught up,” murmured Oliver in a low voice as the others came out of the room, the men and women they were rescuing in their midst.

“Won’t be for long if we don’t move. Company’s not far behind.” Though concerned about the obviously ailing newcomers they’d taken on, at least Karen was alarm and seemingly unharmed. Matt’s relief at that was undeniable.

“Get them moving…I’ll cover.” Having the only range weapon among them, Oliver and his bow made the most sense as cover, and Matt had to trust that anyone coming within range of those arrows would stay alive long enough to be captured once the authorities were made aware of this place.

Whatever the other ways out might be, the elevator they had followed down was no out of service.

Two shots. Two scream. Then nothing save for the distant wail of an alarm.

“Let’s go!” Oliver cried, hurrying the already running group along.

*

The group in dark blue lab coats drew up short, as did Jack and Torelli, when they came face to face at the next T intersection where the lights ahead of them dimmed and the turn to the left, where the lighting was dark.

Was Frank still down that corridor somewhere?

None were faces Jack recognized, but he recognized the name Kozlov as one of those who had been at the medical conference, who had been in the room and was presumed kidnapped as he and the man named Alvarez had been missing during the hastily taken roll call when the hotel hostages were freed. But dressed the same as the others, the same blue, the same style of lab wear, with a name tag like the others, Jack highly doubted the doctor was a victim.

“Where are they?”

“It’s loose!” said the woman with the tag that read Rushing. “It will kill us all!” She and the others could smell the smoke on the two intruders clothes, and they each knew that those were not tranq guns. None among them were combat trained, so until they met up with others of their staff, they were at the strangers mercy.

“If you don’t tell us where those people are you took from the conference, it can have you.” Torelli didn’t know what ‘it’ was and did not care. He wanted the hostages and he wanted them now.

“Where…are…they?” Jack repeated, growling between grinding teeth.

“Safe,” replied the one named Leekie breathlessly. “Or they were. We were separated. We’re looking for safety.”

Jack thought Leekie looked more afraid of those he was with then the men with guns or whatever it was they were supposedly running from. What they should be afraid of was the fire he and Torelli had left behind. Jack shared a look with his partner and the both nodded. He did not believe either Rushing or Mazur for a second, and he wasn’t going to take a chance on them escaping. He nodded, and Torelli grinned wickedly.

“Then it’s good for you we came along. Get moving…before everything behind us catches up.

With the alarm blaring in that corridor, and the devouring darkness stretching out in the corridor from where the group of medical leaders had come from, it left them one other direction to go. The group hesitated as if considering their options, but a shove from Torelli and the waving of Jack’s gun prompted them into action. 

*

There was chaos ahead banging replaced by gunfire met with an exchange of other gunfire. Cassie and Hunter, unarmed and the best chance for protection the others had, kept them back while Oliver, Matt, and John continued forward on silent, stealthy feet. John wasn’t armed either, except for the arrow tip he still carried in his pocket and a scalpel he had picked up in the last room they’d been in. Eventually, in the dim lighting, now flashing red in time with the distant fire alarm’s wail , they found the cluster of armed men and women gathered around the door to a room from which someone was firing back.

“Frank.” Matt recognized the sound of his breathing through the din of gunfire and the sea of thundering, fearful heartbeats. There were bodies upon the floor, victims to Frank’s standoff, and though perhaps they were dead, he was showing restraint in not bursting into the corridor to mow down every person there. They shot at him, or the people with him, and he shot back. There were too many to easily take on all at once, and no cover to use should they turn to shoot at those now arriving…

Until shots from the other corridor to their right dropped both of the shooters at the door and the rest turned to face the new assault. The three men moved, arrows disarming another three as John tackled the person nearest them and Matt threw his batons, knocked out two, and struck another hard enough in the head with his fists to drop him to the floor as well. Those aiming down the side corridor were greeted with a “Don’t shoot! It’s us!” from the cluster of doctors caught between the two men with guns at their back and their own staff prepared to shoot back. 

From inside the room, Frank appeared in the doorway, caught two men at the neck, and brought them together with a crack of skulls. It was the first moment he saw Karen, the moment he realized she was safe. She was the reason he was here. His job was done…or it would be as soon as they got the hell out of here.

Hunter grinned. “Good to see you again, Red. Shoulda know you’d be in on this.”

Though Matt scowled at the words and what they might imply, it was nice to hear another familiar voice. Maybe that would mean other help waiting for them…if they could ever get to the surface.

From somewhere on the other side of the room, there was chaos enough to indicate someone was trying to break through another door…someone else with guns. Real guns, not the tranq guns most of these people carried.

“Drop the weapons!” ordered Jack, assessing quickly that his four allies had incapacitated all but four of the cluster of security soldiers and that there was no reason to shoot again. Those four were outnumbered by men who had enough force to drop each of them before they could get off more than a shot.

One shot might be all it took to thin the enemy, but none of those four considered the risk to be worth it, not while it put the doctors lives in jeopardy. As one, the put their weapons upon the floor.

John motioned to Cassie, and she and Hunter aided those they had rescued closer. “Get them inside…” Less exposed, more easily defendable. At the conjunction of three halls, they were too vulnerable here. Cassie and the others knew where they were now. Out was that way…though whether they could breach the doors and make it past the armed checkpoints along that tunnel with so many weak and unarmed in their care.

Over their shoulders, to the side of the doorway, Cassie met Frank’s gaze with a start. With so many ‘familiar’ faces around her, she shouldn’t be surprised…but that shared moment was unexpected, a feeling akin to ‘what the hell are you doing here’ assaulting her senses, only to be interrupted by, “Cassandra!” a voice that was an even bigger surprise and drew her attention.

“Jack.” She did not ask what he was doing there. Perhaps he was on assignment, perhaps undercover, perhaps her mother had sent him to look for her. Later, when they’d gotten everyone to safety, there would be time enough to get answers. By now the rescued group of patients and the scared silent Donna were inside the room, and Cassie, at the back of the group, had now reached Frank. He looked flustered, as if he wanted to say something, but like a teenage boy had no idea what. Cassie managed to smile, a weary but sincere expression, and pointed at one of the two guns slung over his back while Hunter and Diggle picked up weapons from those unconscious in the corridor.

“Mind if I borrow one of those.”

“Get in there,” snarled Torelli, herding the group of doctors into the room as well pushing them through the opening between Cassie and Frank. Torelli was the only one to notice the bitter glare of hostility Rushing and Muzar gave the bearded man, as if they knew him, but Kozlov continued to remain silent and aloof and Leekie continued to cower and quake with the effort to keep as much distance between himself and Kozlov as possible. The huddled group of patients gave the doctors a wide berth, even Alvarez, but they appeared less hostile to Alvarez then the others, and even less hostile to Leekie when he squeezed next to Alvarez’s side. Karen, clinging to Alvarez’ arm, tried to offer a reassuring smile to the newcomer, but it was reassurance that barely clung to her with every crack that metal door into the changing room suffered.

The gunfire might have ceased, but that banging had not.

As if compelled, without even asking if she knew how to use such weapons, Frank pulled the semi-automatic free. No way was he giving anyone the shotgun. It did not, however, make it into Cassie’s hands as Jack steered the young woman into the room with the others, leaving Frank as the last man man in the doorway.

Frank narrowed his eyes at the back of Jack’s head.

“Make them stop,” Oliver ordered, assuming that one of the doctors in blue had the authority to demand the outside assailants to stand down.

“Why would we…?” began Dr. Rushing’s snapping retort.

John caught the woman with one arm around her neck and the point of the arrowhead scratching against her throat, a threat to plunge it into the artery there a seemingly real enough one that she fell immediately silent.

“You recruited the wrong batch of test subjects,” he snarled, nodding at Oliver.

Muzar cleared his throat, and when a lull in the banging ceased, he called in a tremulous voice, “Please…this is Doctor Muzar…cease now…you do not need to break the door…”

“We heard gunshots…”

“One of the…” He nervously looked at John as the words that stuck in his throat were the same John had just used, and incriminating words he did not want to utter himself. “We had an incident. It has been contained now…stand down and we’ll open the door…”

“Yes sir.”

But no one moved. Busting the door off of the hinges had not worked for them, and the lock had been damaged enough that even if they had a key it was likely going to be futile. Hunter believed he could pick it, or at least he was willing to try, but as they had all been stripped of jewelry of all sorts, he didn’t have a suitable tool. Matt caught Oliver’s eye, cocked his head towards the door. That man’s arsenal of arrows could do more than kill and injure. Surely he had something that could do the job now.

Oliver nodded, drew out an arrow, but before he could knock it, the air shook, the hinges and the metal frame around it popped, groaned, and then tore like paper as the entire door broke free and flew across the room into the opposite wall, narrowly missing the gathered group of people.

The stunned silence that followed the inexplicable event was broken by Rushing’s cry, “Shoot them, you fools!”

Two gun’s came up in the small group that had stood behind the now absent door. From the other doorway, a single shot shattered one man’s hand so that his weapon clattered to the floor. At the same moment, one of Matt’s batons struck the other shooters arm so that his weapon was thrown clear. It discharged as it struck the wall, the bullet going wild and clipping one of the four security agents who had previously been in the firefight with Frank. As he was standing next to Donna, the woman screamed as blood splattered her face and she promptly fainted.

“John.”

With Jack and Torelli’s aim on their captives, and Frank, Oliver, and Matt watching the still uninjured seven beyond that empty doorway, John knew what was wanted. One by one he disarmed each one, taking weapons and the extra clips he found, before knocking each unconscious. Those they had were going to be enough of a handful to get out of here. One of the seven had a handheld radio unit, which John tossed to Matt. Matt in turn passed it in Jack’s direction. If this thing could get an external frequency, the government agent or the cop would be the most likely to have backup they could call in.

Someone had to know of this place. Someone had to do something to put an end to the suffering here, something to free those here against their will and investigate the treatment of those who ‘came willingly’.

“Where does this lead?” Matt asked.

“Parking area…and a long tunnel…” started Karen.

“I’d say two miles long, maybe three…check points,” Hunter added.

Grunting, Frank took another glimpse into the maze of halls and asked, “Armed?”

“Yes,” Alvarez repaired. “Once the alarms were set…”

“There’ll be backup.” There was no use waiting here for that backup to come. Unless that tunnel could accommodate tanks and troop transports, beneath urban New Jersey, they still stood a better chance out there then they did under siege here.

“Then let’s go,” said Matt, leading the way into the changing room, picking a path over unconscious men. Some of the rescued patients lifted Donna to carry her along with them.

It was a small room, the door on the other side quickly reached, another pneumatic door with a keycode lock on the left side panel. “Here…” Leekie stammered, yanking his badge from his lapel and offering it with a shaky hand. Doctor Rushing snatched for it, smacking his wrist with enough force that the laminated card dropped to the floor and slid through the grating there. Cassie growled and being close enough swung hard, her fist striking the woman’s jaw as Karen successfully yanked her badge away.

Frank felt a smirk of satisfaction.

“We’ll just have to use yours,” Karen crowed with more bravado then she felt. She gave the badge to Matt, her fingers lingering against his gloved hand, and after listening to whatever lay beyond, he swiped the ID badge through the console.

The room they were about to enter was even smaller. They were never going to fit, but they could pass through the one of the other two doors. Logic dictated that one of those would take them back to the lobby they had left…and from the sound of distant running feet in the hollow echoes of a vast concrete space, that other door led into the parking area the others had indicated.

“We’ve got company.”

“Open the door, Red…me and Archer got this.”

Frank refused to acknowledge his own suggestion of working side by side with Oliver.

Oliver knelt on one knee at one side of the doorway, bow ready. Frank and the semi-automatic stood above him on the other side. When Matt swiped the keycard, the door opened and Jack immediately thrust their collection of scrub and lab coat adorned hostages into the dark parking area.

“Looks like you cut the lights here too,” Frank chuckled at Oliver, his humor only slightly demeaning this time. The darkness was in their favor…and Oliver was proving himself more useful and less irritating then Frank thought him to be.

“Or someone did.” Despite the running feet, no one was in the immediate area. The opposite tunnel in the distance was as wide as a two lane road, and stretched on straight into the darkness, funneling cool air and a faint shimmer of city sounds that Matt figured he was the only one to hear. Several large turbines lined the walls on either side of the door they had just come through, intake and ejection points for some of the air the maze of tunnels and rooms required. There was room for maybe three dozen cars to park, but all of the slots were empty save one. About ten feet away from where they gathered, there was a van, one that some of the group recognized, illuminated only by the light from the room behind them.

Matt’s suspicion was that someone had turned the lights off here in an attempt to disadvantage them. They had not, however, anticipated him.

“Come on…” Hunter ran towards the van, leading the group towards what little cover it would offer as Matt stepped out into the darkness. The footsteps, those nearest attempting to be stealthy now, were approaching the van. His intent of drawing their fire, while Hunter tried the van door, threw it open, and fumbled around in the hopes of finding the key, was successful. Several shots were taken and Matt avoided each one of them, striking in turn with a flung baton that bounced off the heads of three men before being knocked aside to clatter as it rolled across the pavement. The shots alerted Frank and Oliver to where their attackers were, and they both fired into the darkness. Their shots were met with cries and surprised shouts and the attackers retreated further into the darkness.

“Got ‘em!” Hunter shouted when he found the keys in the ignition.

They could take the van, but they would not all fit. Some were going to be forced to make it out on foot, and Jack took the responsibility for making the call. Their staff hostages and those among them least able to endure a three mile run under hostile conditions were loaded onto the van through the open back door. Doctor Alvarez went with them and the man Frank had given the pistols to climbed in as well. Someone was going to have to provide cover on the way out.

“Karen…go…”

“I’m not leaving you…”

Matt grabbed her hands. “They need you. Live…get this story out there. I’ll be right behind you.”

“Karen…” Alvarez held out his hand, the final bit of coaxing she needed to get into the van. Matt could take care of himself, she knew, but having seen him die once, she was still going to worry about him until she saw him again. He looked at Matt as he waited for her to take his hand, marveling still to see this one man again.

She leaned down from the van, kissed his cheek, and sat next to Alvarez.

“I’ve got ‘em,” Torelli promised, climbing into the front and sliding to the passenger side. The prisoners being under police control was going to raise fewer questions when they got out then would a random group of gunmen and a driver he suspected was at least partially crazy. There was one niggling matter on his conscience, but he couldn’t go back. Simpson’s life, and whatever reason he was here for, wasn’t worth the lives and freedom of the others in the van.

“John…you too.”

Diggle nodded. Out there, under fire, without a weapon, he was going to be useless, but in the close confines of the van he could keep an eye on their prisoners and make sure they were safely delivered to the authorities.

“You should go with them, Frank…” If they were going to have to shoot their way out of that tunnel, there was no one Matt trusted more. He expected Frank not to kill anyone, but more importantly, he expected him to keep Karen and the others safe. And between Frank and Diggle, the two men might just be able to help Matt and Oliver get out unnoticed.

Frank scowled. “You might need me out there, Red…” He was immensely relieved that Karen was safe…but how safe would she be in that tunnel. There was limited firepower on that van, the cop, the man with his handguns…that was it. They’d never make it past armed outposts without him.

If he did his job well, there would be no opposition for Matt and the others, just a clear shot to the surface. With a stoic expression, he nodded his agreement and climbed inside.

“Cassandra…” Jack started.

“I’m going with you…someone needs to watch your back…” She began to close the back door of the van when a fist out of nowhere, an assailant standing behind the door that Matt had not detected as it was just another heartbeat in a sea of heartbeats and Matt’s focus being on the men with guns still lingering at the fringes of his perceptions.

“You’re not going anywhere.”

Cassie reeled from the blow, her nose bloody. Jack’s gun came up and Frank lurched to his feet coming to stand at the back edge of the van as he clung to the upper edge with one hand and prepared to shoot with the other. But rather than fall, Cassie slammed the van door back into her assailant, knocking him off balance long enough for her to get clear of the door as shield and weapon in order to engage Rodrigo face to face.

She hit again with a fury Jack had witnessed before, the ferocity of Clan when they felt backed into a corner or felt their territory was being threatened. Such an exhibition was common among Sentinels. But Cassie was no Sentinel, rather an Omega…that strange mix of both Sentinel and Guide…and though Jack knew her to be a soldier…and a Bruce…he had never seen her fight before. With a raised hand, he kept both Frank and Oliver from throwing in an intervening shot, choosing instead to let the young woman spend the emotions of her ordeal on someone she seemed both to recognize and hold responsible.

Those in the distance inched closer as if to take advantage of the distraction. A spray of bullets from Frank’s gun drove them back.

Rodrigo was a soldier, trained in combat, but he was not Special Forces and he was not Clan. It took Cassie very little time to pin him to the ground beneath her pummeling fists. Suspecting she would kill the man if allowed to continue, Matt knelt beside her and put one hand on the young woman’s shoulder. He started to speak, to say that was enough, but she looked at him with a feral growl, and though he could not see the yellow in her eyes, he could sense the differences about her that made her something more than human. More like him.

Perhaps she had the devil in her too, just like he did.

But his touch, and the immediate recognition of his features was enough to break the impetus to violence. She got to her feet, grabbed Rodrigo by his, and dragged the groaning man to the van. His allies, those doctors and staff with whom he worked stared at the young woman with a mixture of horror and fascination and traces of regret for an opportunity lost.

What a find soldier in their program she would have been.

“We’ll make sure he gets what’s coming to him,” Diggle promised, hoisting Rodrigo out of her hands and into the van.

“I’ll lay down cover for you,” offered Oliver, three arrows ready for use.

“Hey.” Cassie had started to turn away; Jack’s argument for putting her into the van now dropped, but a large hand on her shoulder stopped her. She looked up into Frank Castle’s face; he was holding out his shotgun to her. “You’re gonna need this.”

For what lay ahead of him, the semi-automatic was going to be much better suited, and whatever doubts he’d had about her earlier request for a gun had been laid to rest in the fight with Rodrigo.

She took it from him with no external display of gratitude. This was soldier to soldier. They understood one another. “I’ll get it back to you,” she promised.

“Yea,” Frank muttered. “You better.”

Hunter gunned the engine and threw the van into reverse, spinning it around with a roar and the screech of tires as Oliver’s arrows laid a smoke screen between them and those with the guns. “Run!” shouted Jack, he and Cassie side by side, leading 11 subjects they’d rescued up the tunnel’s gradual incline. The one she had freed, the familiar face she knew would return to Tigh Ard with her, was hanging towards the back, running, though slowly, with a pensive look of confusion that made him look over his shoulder at the men protecting the rear. It was as if he knew them without knowing them…or at least felt he should.

“I should get my…”

But the remaining gunmen opened fire on those fleeing on foot, costing Matt the opportunity to retrieve the baton he had thrown earlier. He was going to have to make due with one.

“They’re not going to outrun bullets,” Oliver muttered.

“Then you and I will make sure they don’t have to.”

They exchanged a look and a nod before rushing headlong through the smoke, that cover being the only thing that kept them from being shot at and killed.

With no one now to cover their rear flank, she fell back to drive them on, following Jack’s lead and the first eruption of gunfire ahead of them. It was the last time, Cassie suspected, she would see the Arrow or Daredevil again.


	13. 13

“Fish in bucket,” said the heavily accented man with Frank’s handguns as he, Frank, and Torelli gunned down the six men in the first guard post they sped past. With Hunter’s foot on the gas, there was no taking their time for second shots. They had to do it right the first time if those running behind were to make it out alive.

“Fish in a barrel,” Torelli corrected with a laugh. But yeah. “Fish in a barrel.”

From his precarious position on the back lip of the van where he could shoot over the roof, Frank called down, “Barrel number two, coming up.”

With the foreigner aiming out the left, and Torelli aiming out the right, Frank steadied his aim, muttered, “One batch, two batch…penny and dime…”

…and squeezed the trigger again.

**

There were a few security guards that required putting down, injured men to shoot at them or report their locations, and Jack felt little compunction about doing his job. Fortunately, Frank and those in the van had done theirs so that, by the time that the group, slowed only a little by the weakened condition of some of those in their midst, there was a collection of black vans and cars. A few were Jersey police, but most, and the collection of suited men and women, wore the familiar countenances of government agents. Medical personnel were treating those who needed it and were putting them in transport vehicles that might have been ambulances except for their dark, non-descript paint jobs. The others had been separated into groups, those who had been kidnapped from the hotel in one group, those freed from below in another, those Torelli indicated had been responsible for that abduction and the abuse of the medical patients he and others had freed. Frank stood with Torelli, who was trying to explain that they were together, that Frank was a private security consultant that had helped them track the abductees to this place.

When Torelli saw Jack and his group, he pointed to the woman he spoke with and barked, “Him…ask him! He’ll tell you the same thing!”

The woman in the smart blue business suit looked Jack up and down as he and his group emerged from the tunnel. She looked over the others as well making some sort of assessment and waited for them to reach her before speaking.

“Jack Bauer.”

He wagered it was mid-morning at the latest, as the sun was not yet at its midday peak but was high enough to make the day’s heat particularly noticeable after having spent so long in the environmentally controlled medical bunker. That meant they’d been down there more than nine hours…likely closer to twelve, although it certainly had not felt that long at the time. It had been nearly an hour at least to run that three mile stretch of tunnel, taking into account the brief stops at each guard outpost and accommodating the weakest among them. He was hungry, thirsty, and tired, but mostly he was relieved to be above ground in the open air where he could breathe easy again.

Most of the rescues had clumped together, but the tall man Cassie had connected to through that window, a man who had lost his shirt somewhere back in that tunnel and now wore only pale yellow sweat pants, stayed near her. He did not look like a man used to fear, but Cassie couldn’t blame him for not trusting people in unmarked government vehicles.

She didn’t trust them either.

Under her breath she asked, “Your name?”

He blinked at her as if no one had ever asked him that question before. He glanced down at his bare arm, and the numbers tattooed there, and eventually said, “Henryk…”

Of course it was. Cassie nodded with a reassuring small smile. “Whatever they ask…you’re with me, okay? Let me talk…don’t say anything.”

Henryk nodded.

“Director Lowell.” Jack had met the woman once or twice at CTU functions, but he did not actually know her beyond things Chloe had told him of her. Ronnie Lowell was, according to Chloe, generally fair in her dealings with people, but she also had a reputation of being a demanding hard ass who did not appreciate her people cutting corners or working outside the rules. Lowell was the number one reason Chloe had discouraged Jack from switching to the NY office; his penchant for breaking rules and taking risks would have landed him immediately on suspension.

By her expression, Jack knew she was none too happy to see him here.

Still, he offered his hand. “Good to see some friendly faces. How did you find us…”

“Chloe.” She accepted Jack’s handshake but she did not seem pleased to do so.

“Is she okay? Where is she?”

“In a safehouse…where she’ll stay until this is over. What the hell is the meaning of this, Jack? Chappelle says you’re on medical leave…”

That was a relief. He wanted to talk to her, make sure she was alright himself…apologize for involving her in this, but he had to agree with Lowell. Chloe and Morris remaining safe until the threat was past made the most sense for everyone. “I am…believe me, I didn’t look for this. Sergeant Bruce there,” he pointed at Cassie, “is the daughter of some dear friends of mine…granddaughter of Admiral Thorne. When I fell into this situation…and heard she had been abducted…Torelli and I…”

Lowell snorted. Admiral Thorne was a well-known name in any military circle. While she had not known that Bauer had any connection, however tenuous, to the Admiral, she did acknowledge that any man would have been a fool to pass up the opportunity to save one of the man’s family members and thus ingratiate himself into the lap of political favor. It wasn’t a story to tell now, however. There were too many ears, and protocol demanded proper security for something of this magnitude. “Save it for the debriefing, Jack. Tell me who’ve we got here…”

“Most of them were locked up down there…patients…test subjects…there are more…dozens more…and a fire…”

“Officer Torelli mentioned the fire…we’re sending in sweeper teams getting everyone out of there. Right now…all of you,” she gestured to those behind Jack, “If you will go with…”

“Excuse me ma’am…Henryk’s with me…” Unafraid of speaking up, military training and Clan blood giving her enough confidence to stand her ground, Cassie stepped forward and saluted. Salutes generally won over a lot of people in positions of government power. It was worth a shot.

“That may be, Sergeant,” Lowell said crisply, “but you understand…we have to be sure they’re all healthy…we don’t know what was done to them…what contaminates…”

“He’s healthy…I guarantee that.”

Lowell narrowed her gaze; she’d heard that Admiral Thorne was Clan…and that Clan ran in families…which meant this young woman likely was too. It was said that some Clan could smell disease…like dogs…but she was not going to risk the lives of the general population on the off chance that such a story was true.

“You’ll be taking those kidnapped from the hotel for examination as well, won’t you?” Jack asked hastily, used to playing this particular political game. “Why not let her travel with him?” He already knew Henryk’s face, if not the name, and thus knew he was a clone. Many of the others were too, perhaps all of them and as a new House Mistress, if she was anything like her mother, her empathy for these men and women was going to be huge.

Though Lowell scowled, she nodded once and said, “Wait here.” They were going to need more medical transports, and another non-medical one, and she was going to have to sort out the paperwork details with the Jersey police before they were allowed to go anywhere.

Unsupervised now, Frank and Torelli were able to join Jack, both with the pensive expressions of men accustomed to debriefings and to being concerned with the outcome. Jack stepped away from Cassandra and the others to have what he expected would be a necessarily private conversation. “You think they believe us?” Torelli asked, handing Jack a bottle of water he had swiped from the back of one of the medical vans.

Frank, however, felt more immediate concern. “Where are they?”

Jack glanced over his shoulder back into the tunnel. “They were keeping those gunmen off our back.” He was worried too, but both were grown men, men with remarkable gifts and skills, men who had made a choice on behalf of the greater good. None of them knew how many shooters had been in the parking garage, and now there were CTU sweeper teams starting into the tunnels with floodlights and guns and medical equipment. He did not think the debriefing would begin until that entire bunker was cleared, and if, somehow, Arrow and Daredevil had survived, they were going to have to make it out of there without being seen. They might evade interrogation, but only if they somehow got out of there without being seen.

How men in red and green like that could be unnoticed in broad daylight was a concern, but Jack assumed they must have some means. If nothing else, maybe they could get back to the vehicles left at the park…

Jack groaned. How was he gonna get his car back? Odds were, it had already been towed.

“They’ll have to believe us. We’ll have to leave those two out…”

“You really think they will?”

Frowning at Torelli’s words, Jack shrugged. “Well…none of them know how they got there…and they were working together…so we keep it that way. The three of us came into this together…didn’t know they were here until the end…last we saw them was when they held off the others so we could get everyone clear.” He wondered now if the two working together, then staying behind, had been their plan from the start. It certainly made sense in hindsight.

“And if they don’t resurface?” growled Frank.

“We keep our ears open…to everything the agents say…to every news agency and law enforcement frequency…and if need be, we go in after them.” As soon as he made sure Cassandra was safely on her way home, Jack was certainly willing to undertake a second rescue mission. Maybe he was growing weary of the usual CTU risk but this particular work had been unexpectedly satisfying…and not just because he had saved Cassandra.

Frank snorted, noting the arrival of three more transport vans and two armored troop carries; the troop carries proceeded down into the tunnel but the transports opened their doors and welcomed the rest of the escapees inside for medical evaluation and debriefing. The prisoners, all save the badly beaten Rodrigo, were put in a separate van and the final vehicle waited the three men who had, as far as could currently be determined, managed this rescue and arrest. “Promise or no promise,” he muttered, “I’ll kill every goddamn one of them if they’ve done anything to Red…”

Torelli bristled, his first cop instinct being to arrest a man for making threats of murder. But just as quickly, the feeling past and he nodded, especially when Jack added, “I’ll be right there with you.” He wasn’t dealing in cop territory here. He was in military, or at least governmental, rescue and extraction. If it was one thing he’d learned today, sometimes you had to do whatever it took. Sometimes you had to make hard choices.

Sometimes you had to question whether being a cop was what you were cut out to be.

**

The cleanup of the gunmen in the parking structure took less time and effort then either man expected, with only six men to contend with, a number that either Oliver or Matt could have managed alone. In the silence that followed, Oliver took the first opportunity since they’d gone down the elevator shaft to look at his watch for the time. It was daylight now, and there was no way they were getting out of this tunnel without someone noticing them. They weren’t exactly inconspicuously dressed. After a brief discussion, the decided on the only thing they could do…retrace their steps through the bunker, get back to the elevator shaft, and return the way they had come.

But with the alarms still blaring and the power not yet restored to all of the corridors, there were still workmen armed with tools and security agents armed with tranq guns and real guns, seeking the sources of the various disturbances. Having found the location of the fire, which had now burned itself out for lack of fuel and oxygen, the damaged cafeteria and library doors, the bodies, the destroyed labs, it was easy to interpret that some sort of breach had occurred. This kept the staff on edge, and while interns and scientists and medical staff gathered together in secure rooms for safety or else tended to patients and test subjects, others swept the halls for the problems.

Two of those problems knocked out every group they found, whether security or repair staff. Freed patients and test subjects were directed back toward the parking garage, both Matt and Oliver hoping they would make it to freedom rather than being recaptured and subjected to even worse treatment than before. They could have remained with them, tried to escort them to freedom, and it was all Matt could do to not take them to safety himself.

But Oliver was right. They needed to rejoin the others…and they needed to avoid being caught, thus risking the reveal of their identities to the public they were sworn to help. They had done what they had come to do, had steered these survivors to safety and armed them with every tranq gun they’d picked up along the way. Having cleared the way of threats, there was little reason to think they could not make it safely away on their own.

Eventually they found their way back to the elevator and began their climb after being sure the cables were cut so that the car could not be used. They could not tell if anyone had used it for escape during the night, but now that it was daylight, it seemed unlikely that any here would risk public exposure. When they reached the janitor closet, it was thankfully empty, allowing them the opportunity to change from their suits into janitorial coveralls that were folded upon one of the shelves. Suits and weapons were stashed in two large black trash bags and then, as nonchalantly as they could, they sauntered out of the closet as if they were staff, chatting about a ‘bad accident’ they had encountered on the way to work that morning. The woman at the reception desk, currently speaking in an animated high squeak to someone upon the phone, waved at them but paid them no other attention.

Sitting in Oliver’s car, which thankfully had been neither towed nor ticketed in the spot where it had been parked earlier the previous day, the bags safely stowed in the trunk, Matt leaned back against the seat and closed his eyes. “I could sleep for a week.”

“After a hot shower and good meal,” Oliver agreed, scrubbing on hand over his face and then through his hair.

“You think we can find that tunnel entrance?”

“I dunno.” Underground, there had been little sense of direction, no surface sounds and very few indicators of precisely where they were. Given enough time to drive circles around the park, in a two to four mile radius, they’d probably locate it but from the geography they both realized that the tunnel entrance might even be east of Central Park. There was, without more research, no way to know. “We’re not exactly in peak condition to undertake that quest right now, I think. Let me see if I can raise Bauer…”

He had left his cell phone in the car, but he had no idea if Jack had his on him or not. His attempted call went to the other man’s voicemail, and Oliver said only, “Checking in…tell us you’re all okay,” before hanging up and tossing the phone in frustration onto the dashboard. There was no point in calling Diggle. His phone had not been on him in the bunker, and, wherever it was, it was likely going to need to be replaced.

Hopefully John would think to call him as soon as he could get to a phone.

“Anywhere in particular I should drop you?”

“Home is good…” By now Matt expected the police presence at the hotel would have cleared out, as it had been nearly two days since the hostage crises had begun. He could shower, change, sleep…reach out to Jack, to Frank, to Torelli…whomever might be able to tell him what had happened to everyone else. He was going to have to reach out to them first…otherwise he would never be able to sleep. Or maybe Oliver would hear from someone first and pass the information along.

Either way, there was little they could do but wait this one out.

It was probably wisest, he thought with a stifled yawn, to contact Claire and Foggy after he determined that Karen had made it out of the complex alive.

Oliver didn’t hold back his yawn. He needed to sleep too…but probably not at home…not unless he wanted to answer twenty questions for Ruth. “Home it is then,” he agreed.


	14. 14

Through the window of Director Lowell’s office, where Jack had spent nearly eight hours being questioned by Lowell and a series of other government agency bureaucrats, men and women that Jack was fairly certain had a security clearance far above Lowell’s and likely far more secretive. Their questions consisted largely of details about what he had seen in that facility, any names he had learned, the nature of the fire, whether he, Torelli, or Frank had known anyone there. Eventually they seemed satisfied that no secrets had been exposed, which told him that Chloe had been right. What they had stumbled into, through their joint efforts, had been something of a highly classified government installment…a medical Area 51. He worried for the others, for Cassie and those abducted and brought there under false pretense, for they had been given a tour, complete or not, and had undoubtedly seen things not meant to be seen by civilian eyes. And Frank…if he was a wanted man, like Torelli suggested, could they afford to let him go? Would they try to pin all of this on him, make him the fall guy for every death that occurred there?

Could they get away with that given that this whole affair began with what appeared to be a government sanctioned kidnapping of civiians?

When he saw Frank, surrounded by armed guards, escorted past the window, their gazes meeting briefly, with Frank’s looking angry and betrayed, Jack thought that was exactly what was happening.

Lowell came back into the office after speaking to the last collection of suits who had questioned jack and the long absence that followed, long enough to lead to questions of just how much they wanted him to sweat, Jack stood up to greet her, his gaze cool. He couldn’t see a clock, had no watch any longer as it had been taken when they’d brought him here, but he’d guess it had been nearly two hours of sitting there alone. “You want my cooperation, you’ve gotta give me something.”

“What makes you think you have anything we want?”

“I’m CTU…you know I do…”

“Were CTU…”

“On medical leave…my clearance is still active.”

Lowell arched one eyebrow as she took her seat on the other side of the table. She knew Bauer’s reputation. Keeping him free of cuffs was a risk…but if he wanted her dead, he would have found a way even with cuffs. She was experienced enough in field work to see that, while he had lost neither his edge nor his skill, he had lost some of his taste for the job. There was a weariness around his eyes that had nothing to do with his lack of sleep and the final absence of adrenalin in his system.

“Send them home…all of them. None of them asked for this…and Castle and Torelli were working with me. If anyone’s going down for this, it’s me…and if even one of them goes down with me, I’ll make damn sure everything I know is made public.”

Lowell’s expression didn’t change. She expected nothing less from Bauer; no matter how unorthodox he could be, he was a damn good agent, the best she’d ever crossed paths with. It was why she hated what she was going to have to say next.

“It’s being handled, Jack. As soon as everyone has been processes, you’re all free to leave. But…” She leaned her elbows upon the table. “Chapell is expecting you…and there will be further inquiry as to you part of this. You’ve put one of our best agents at risk…”

Chloe. She was safe, that much Jack had deduced, but Lowell’s words suggested that Chloe was somewhere that not even CTU could find her, and whatever files Chloe had accessed, whatever data she had seen, were too dangerous to be allowed into the world. If they could real her back in, they were going to scare the crap out of her to keep her quiet…or else find some way to silence her more permanently. Either way, her position in CTU, as well as her life, were at risk, and Jack had no way to protect her.

“She was trying to help me save hostage…we didn’t know what we’d find. If anyone’s to blame for this, its whatever suits thought that kidnapping civilians for their little project was an acceptable risk.” The odds were that they had expected those missing few wouldn’t be missed in the hotel chaos, that they would be presumed missing, no more…that no one would have noticed the bus…let alone find it…or find the final destination. They had not counted on the joint efforts of men like Daredevil, Arrow, and Punisher. Those three might have succeeded without Jack, without Torelli…but Jack and Torelli would not have succeeded without them. Jack had no delusions about that.

Lowell said nothing for many moments, until she cleared her throat, reached for a pen, and began to sign the collection of documents she had carried in with her. “When you hear from her, you will let us know.”

If she was wise, Jack thought, he would be the last person she reached out to. But he, like Lowell, knew Chloe had incredible respect for him, respect that had been prone in the past to prompt her to perhaps unwise choices.

“If…I hear from her…” was Jack’s response, although they both understood he had no intention of telling anyone within CTU where Chloe was…at least not right away.

She pushed all of his belongings across the desk towards him, including his gun. On reflex, he checked to see if it was still loaded. One in the clip and a full chamber, just as he’d left it. The other clips, however, had been confiscated. He did not complain, surprised she was trusting him with this much inside the office. “You’re dismissed, Jack. We’ll be in touch…but don’t let me see you back here like this again.”

He nodded and left the room, understanding that tone all too well. The amount of bureaucratic paperwork he’d caused her was going to keep her busy for days. It was going to take at least that long to clean out that bunker and sift through every detail they’d gathered.

“Jack.” Cassie met him at the bottom of the stairs where she waited with some of the others to be escorted into a lobby area where cars would be waiting to take them to their desired destinations. They were allowed no phone calls, in case the access to an outside line, and outsiders, put the office at risk. They had been given clothes, nothing fancy…sweat pants and tee shirts and slip on shoes normally reserved for prisoners or for field agents who needed clean clothes…but it was better than the flimsy cleansuits they had been wearing for the last several hours. They were in need of sleep, showers, and a meal better than coffee, donuts and deli sandwiches, but they were being freed, and that was Jack’s only concern. Only Torelli, Frank, and Dr. Alvarez was not among them, and the cluster of patients they had freed were all held in the conference room. Being clones, Jack had no idea what their fate would be, but at least one of them was heading towards a secure home. That one stood behind Cassie, still looking like an animal caught in a spotlight.

For a moment, Jack scowled, as he wondered how he could secure freedom for the others as well.

Seeing the line of his gaze, Karen said, “I’ve got all their names…I’m gonna do my best to see them taken care of…” She offered her hand. “Karen Page…thank you…”

Hunter scratched at the back of his head. Having his own quasi-governmental clearance, he, unlike others, had gotten his phone call. “Yeah…thanks for this. I think I’ve got them covered…not chancing that they’ll end up on an auction block and go right back where they started. But where’s the others?”

“They’ll be on their way soon…” Except, he suspected, Alvarez. Though he was a hostage, he was also a man who knew too much of the insides of that bunker. He’d have a hell of a story to tell, and he would be held until every detail of it was shared. What became of him after that would depend on whether those at the top of the food chain thought he still had uses, could be trusted, or thought he had outlived any function they might need him for.

“But…the others…?”

Jack knew who Karen meant and all he could do was shrug. “I don’t know.” He wished he could say more. An agent with a badge beckoned them to follow him into the elevator. “You’ve all got places to go?”

Most heads bobbed, except Hunters. “My ride’s coming…” he said evasively, the realization those words left in their wake made Jack wonder just what sort of agent Hunter was. It had not occurred to him that anyone of those hostages might be agents in their own rights. Or might have been. “Not leaving them here.” He cocked his head towards the conference room.

Cassie reached for his hand. “Best of luck to you, Hunter…” It was her offering of thanks for having her back, and accepted it with a grin and returned handshake.

“See you around, Cass…I’ll serve with you any time.”

“Please,” said the man with the badge. “The cars are waiting.”

But Donna, her countenance now as gray as her eyes, refused to move and muttered, “How do we know they’ll take us home? Maybe they’re going to take us back…there…”

A marginally rational fear, Jack turned his head as Frank was brought out of a corridor that led deeper into the complex. He had been given clean clothes as well, and though he was not cuffed, the men with him still carried weapons intended to subdue him if necessary. Jack couldn’t be sure, but it looked as if Frank sported a few bruises and a split lip he hadn’t had earlier, and some of his escorts from earlier were not among those with him now. A lot could happen in two hours, and he knew Frank was damn lucky, as they left him with those about to enter the elevator, to being released at all.

Maybe they thought he was too much trouble to contain. Maybe they expected the cops to pick him up and get him out of their hair. Hell, Jack thought bitterly, he wouldn’t put it past Lowell to have NYPD officers waiting downstairs for Frank, and for all, or most, of them to be killed in the subsequent chaos.

For a moment he met Cassie’s gaze, but he quickly looked away. If Jack didn’t know any better, he would swear it was reaction of a man ashamed or embarrassed about his behavior…or at least a man uncomfortable around a woman.

“I’ll ride with you,” Diggle offered. He had said nothing yet; this wasn’t his first debriefing, his first ‘combat’ situation, and so he was not as rattled as some of the others might be. What he was, was worried, about Ruth, about Oliver, and he was anxious to get home, to get anywhere there was a way to reach out to either of them.

“If they put us in multiple cars we’ll follow you each stop…until you’re home,” Jack promised.

The elevator lurched to a stop and the doors opened into the street level lobby. Night time again, or nearly so. Ten hours in this building had robbed them of the sun, but as they were all likely to sleep as soon as they reached a safe bed, it was just as well. Beyond the glass doors, a long limousine waited, a summer rain beaded upon its shiny black surface, either an effort on the government’s part to apologize for the hell these people had been through, or an effort to cut the costs of multiple cars and drivers. Thankfully, there were no police to be seen thus far. If they were out in the street, no one was going to know that until it was too late.

“Think I’m gonna skip this ride,” Frank grumbled. He’d never been one for fancy cars, and he’d had enough close quarters with multiple people for a week. He just wanted to be left alone now…and maybe to find out what had become of Red.

“Wait…” Cassie took a pen and a paper from the lobby desk, unconcerned with whether it was an important paper or not, and quickly wrote out her name, address and cell number. It was an offer she doubted he would accept, but she felt compelled to try. When she shoved it into Frank’s hand, she said, “If you ever need somewhere…” Not someone…he was the sort of man accustomed to not needing anyone. But there might come a day he needed sanctuary, might need to get away from Hell’s Kitchen…might just need a change of scenery. “We owe you. It’s there if you need it.”

Frank stood frozen, holding the door as the others passed through, maybe too stunned by the offer to react.

Or maybe, Jack thought as Diggle held the car door and helped the others inside, he too had concerns about the possibility of police waiting for him and didn’t want anyone else caught in the crossfire.

“Take care of this…” CTU might have confiscated every one of Frank’s weapons, but after what they’d been through together, Jack wasn’t going to send him out onto the street defenseless. Maybe Frank wouldn’t need it; maybe there were no hidden cops or snipers waiting for him. But Jack would sure as hell make sure Frank had a fighting chance at freedom.

Frank took the gun, tested its weight in his hand, and nodded. He knew she was loaded and full. “Get outta here,” he grunted. It was the closest he was going to get to a sentimental goodbye.

Diggle and then Jack got into the limo and the door closed. Through the tinted glass Jack watched Frank step out of the building, scan his surroundings like the well trained soldier he was, and then cross the street as if daring anyone to be brave enough to take the shot, pistol in one hand, piece of now crumpled paper in the other.

For as long as Jack could see him, no shots came. Frank disappeared into the shadows and Jack and the others were headed for homes and hotels, safety and freedom. But none of them, Jack imagined, were going to sleep well tonight.

*

Matt had not bothered to shower, or to eat, upon returning to his loft. The bag with his suit was tossed onto the sofa, the clothes he wore were stripped off and left in a trail from the sofa to the refrigerator, and then from the refrigerator to his bed as soon as the icy beer was guzzled with a haste that drove a spike of pain between his eyes. By the time he collapsed upon the bed, however, that pain was lost, buried beneath exhaustion.

More than once during that sleep, his subconscious registered the ringing of his phone, the beep of calls going to voice mail, but he made no effort to answer them, no effort to swim towards wakefulness. There was healing to be done, fractured bones, bruised muscles, cut flesh, injuries that would only leave him if he gave his body the opportunity to recover it needed. He also had no desire to think, to give consideration to some of what he had witnessed in that place, for there were questions there he could not answer…that he suspected he would not like the answers to when he found them.

He should leave the matter of his ‘death’ alone, stop pursuing mysteries better left unexplored. Let it be, his sleeping mind told him. Don’t wake those sleeping dogs or one of them was going to bite him in the ass.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

His lids fluttered open, his brain only partially awake. He waited in silence, decided it had been a sound of dreams, and closed his eyes again.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

This time, without opening his eyes, he is hand flopped out to tap the speaker button on his clock. Eight forty two p.m. Matt frowned, wondering how long he had slept, but the musings were split in two by the knocking again. Not a loud knock, not with the fierceness he had first imagined upon waking, but firm and persistent nonetheless. A single person, alone in the corridor, but not he thought with a groan as he moved from the exact position he had landed in last night and scooped up his boxers from the end of the bed where they had been dropped.

He should put on clean ones, but not until he showered. And not until he answered that determined knocking.

Tying his robe around his waist, he trudged towards the door, reaching it as the knock began again. “Who is it,” he groused. Not Foggy, as his friend would be shouting to the rooftops for him by now or would have made some effort to force his way inside. And not Frank, for he certainly would have. Oliver then, although he thought the man had more civility than that.

“Please…Mr. Murdock…a word…”

That voice again. Damn it, Matt thought as he unhooked the locks and opened the door. Why did he know that name?

But if he was here then maybe…

“Karen? The others…? Is everyone okay?”

The bearded man slid inside after a furtive glance back down the corridor, and pushed the door out of Matt’s hands to close and lock it before replying. “They are…they will be…they are being questioned by the rescuing agents…they’ll be released soon.”

“How do you know? What do…?”

“What they want is me...but I told them I have one thing to do first…one thing before…” He caught Matt’s face in his hands, rubbing his thumbs over his unshaven cheeks, his hands trembling. “My boy…I never thought…what are you doing back here?”

It was a comforting touch at first, like a father to a son, a touch that brought back two conflicting bits of memory that both reassured and confused him. “Back here? What do you mean?”

“The Hand? Did you…?”

Matt pulled away from the man’s hands. “What do you know of the Hand? Who are you? What do you want with me?” For a man unaccustomed to fear, he was beginning to feel an uncomfortable sense of panic.

“Sit, Matty…I will try to…”

“No one calls me Matty except my father and…” And someone else…a masculine accented voice…

…his voice.

Stunned, more confused than ever, Matt bumped into the arm chair behind and collapsed back into it, catching the arm of the chair with his ass in a way that sent a jolt of pain up his tailbone and spine.

“Who…?”

“Gael Alvarez…”

“I know that.” They had already been formerly introduced and Matt knew him to be a doctor and a scientist. “I mean…what are you to me? How do you know me? What do you want with me?”

“I wanted you to be safe…and happy…a long ways from here,” the man said with a sigh of regret. “I should have known instinct would pull you back, but I had hoped the pull would…you would find a reason not to…”

“You knew about The Hand? Did you send me to Havensport…?”

“I’d heard talk…and that was why they killed you before…the other you, that is…I’m sure of it.”

Matt could feel the color draining from his cheeks. “The…other…me?” He was up out of his chair, leaning over Alvarez with one arm across the man’s throat. “I suggest you start at the beginning, doctor, he growled, “before I do something we’ll both regret.”

“You won’t hurt me.”

Matt was less certain of that, but as the stayed like that, neither man relenting, he gradually became aware that Alvarez was not afraid of him. He was afraid of something else, yes, but not of Matt. Growling again, he returned to his chair, more carefully this time, and grunted, “Talk.”

“As you know…my field of research is genetic modification and sequencing. I’ve been part of a team of researchers for decades whose intent it was to help our soldiers in the field to heal faster…serve better…live longer. Or at least…that was what we started out doing…what I thought we still did. I eventually began to realize that there were other plans for my research…dangerous plans…but I couldn’t get out…” He sighed. “I think you knew that; I think that’s partially why you came back.”

There were dozens of questions Matt could have asked, but he bit his tongue and waited.

“Sometimes I’d send one or two of you out into the world…to see how you’d fair. Claire wasn’t first…but she was my protégé…my special project. She never knew, of course…she still doesn’t. But she knows enough. When she brought me the tale of a Japanese fellow the police had killed…a man who already bore the scars of an autopsy…I knew. You were the man Hell’s Kitchen needed…so I sent you out into the world after them…but I did not know I was being watched, that they had agents in the lab…in the police force…I sent Mr. Castle to aid you…but it wasn’t enough. I thought you would be too valuable of an asset to them…that the most they would do would be to capture you and bring you back to the lab. I never thought they would kill you…”

“Who are they?”

“I don’t know. Your death was covered up, another random, pointless Hell’s Kitchen murder…and no one ever dug deeper. No one but Frank. By then I’d been warned not to dig, to leave it alone…that my knowledge is valuable but not THAT valuable…but they didn’t know there was already you…”

“But I’d died…”

Alvarez shook his head. “Your predecessor died…not you. I modify and sequence genetic code…I create clones of…fictitious…individuals….”

Matt could feel his eyes trying to blink in disbelief, could feel the pressure build in his lungs as he tried to breathe. “I’m…I’m a…” Fictitious? Was he even real?

“He knew,” Alvarez said apologetically, inching towards the edge of the sofa in case Matt needed his medical help. “I thought you did too…”

It explained so many things, looks Logan had given him, comments made by a variety of others that had made no sense and seemed out of context at the time, memories he had that did not match up with the reality of the world in which he found himself. It explained a grave with his name on it. Did Foggy know? Did Karen and Claire? Who else?

“How many…?”

“Only you…by my hands…but anyone with the right…ingredients…”

“Make me sound like a damned cake,” Matt snapped as he stood and walked toward the brightly lit panel of windows. There was a billboard there, something bright enough to disturb the sleep of his guests, but which did not bother Matt at all.

“No…no…a fine man…and a stronger one, I dare say from what I’ve seen, then he was…”

“So you refined the mix.”

“I…well…” Another apologetic sigh and Alvarez replied, “Yes.” When Matt did not speak again, Alvarez continued. “Information Frank uncovered had indicated a Havensport connection, and so I sent you there. It took time to get you out…and I had to make sure you went where you were needed…”

“So you sent me with a briefcase of cryptic information and a head wiped of recent memories.” If erasing memories could be done to soldiers, there was no reason it couldn’t be done to a made-up man. Hell, it was probably easier.

Alvarez went to the refrigerator and pulled out a beer; he did not ask and Matt did not stop him. “Many of you will form an immediate attachment to the places of your first memories…or to a man or woman called master or mistress in common parlance…”

“We’re slaves?”

“No…no…not at all…although…as you saw…there are less…honorable…uses for you…” He drank deeply and added, “I never wanted any of you to be test subjects. That’s not what you’re for…it’s not right to use a living person that way.”

But are we people? It was an argument Matt chose not to get into at this time. Soon as he had a few moments to breathe and think, however, that good old Catholic schoolboy guilt was going to light a fire like nothing else ever had.

“I’d hoped that Havensport would be that for you…that you would not come back here. I’m certain those who wanted you dead before, will still want you dead again…and those who knew of my connection to your predecessor…they will assume my connection to you.” Undoubtedly, he knew, Kozlov and the others already did. “I did not realize the pull to your canon memories…those of the life you knew…could draw you back…and that maybe residual memories of the lab could do so as well…”

“I didn’t find that lab through any memories.” He was not, however, going to admit how they did find it.

“Well…good…that’s good to know.” Disappointing, perhaps, that some memory of the man who had given him life and sent him into the world had not remained to draw Matt back in Alvarez’s time of need, but it was good to know that not every clone let loose from that place, their memories of it also removed, were not likely to return to it in a swarm demanding answers.

Matt cocked his head, listening to something that his guest could not yet hear over the usual city sounds. By the time Matt determined where that rhythmic cut of blades and rotors intended to land, however, Alvarez could hear it too.

“They’re here for me…”

“I won’t let them…” He had already scrambled for his suit, dropped the robe, and prepared to wrestle into it.

“You will.” The doctor caught both wrists and held him firmly. “If you fight them, they will take us both. This way…maybe I can still do some good before…”

The heavy weight of the helicopter made the ceiling groan.

“Your account…you have enough to last years…a life time…if you’re frugal…wise. Find Melvin…keep him safe, Matthew. I told him you would. Follow your instincts…you can set your own path now…live your life. Don’t feel like you have to stay here if you don’t belong…and whatever you do…don’t come for me. Leave it be, Matthew. It will be better this way.”

There was pounding upon the locked door to the roof, and then sounds Matt could only describe one way. They were going to blow his door, maybe his who apartment, and if he fought them here, he had a hotel full of guests to consider. And what of Foggy, of Karen, of Claire…of Frank and Oliver and…his thoughts turned towards others, others he missed in spite of himself.

Alvarez was acting on behalf of countless others. He was acting on Matt’s behalf, and Claire’s…and shouldn’t that be his choice to make?

“Your father would be proud, Matthew.,” Alvarez said, his words buried beneath the controlled detonation that burst the lock from the door and the heavy booted feet that entered. Three men. Men with guns. Without his batons, the nearest thing he had to throw was a lamp, but that would shatter after hitting the first target. Matt could avoid any shots directed at him, but he was too far away to shield the doctor, and if one of them chose to shoot the older man, Matt’s effort would be for naught.

“I know I am.”

Hands raised in surrender, his suit around his ankles, his body bare except for black silk boxers Matt dropped onto the sofa and stared, unseeing, at the gesture Alvarez made in his direction before being taken out of the loft. He listened until all the men were in the helicopter, listened for the sound of the chopper lifting from the roof, and when there was no going back, he shouted long and loud in frustration before weight of their conversation collapsed upon him.

*

Torelli’s head felt like it would split, a pain he didn’t think even a good strong drink would. Any commendation he would receive from this capture and rescue he’d been involved in would come on the back of his partner’s suspicious behavior…and he still hadn’t found the man in all of those they’d killed or captured. From what he’d over heard, after his hours spent with nothing but coffee and questions and reports to fill out in an interrogation room that smelled of sweat and piss, the cops weren’t even being allowed into the bunker. The Feds had taken over, escorted everyone still alive, staff and patient alike, into unmarked vans, and had then locked the place down. There were still men working within, and though the Jersey PD kept a perimeter, no one was allowed in or out, and no one without proper government credentials were allowed past the police line.

If Simpson had been among those found within, no one would say so. The only thing Torelli could learn was that IA had wasted no time in suspending Simpson for his kill in the hotel and that Simpson had last been seen leaving the precinct in a furious huff.

Not the last time, Torelli thought grimly as he stepped outside into the early evening air. He breathed deep, wishing for a moment he had not given up smoking. Too many hours spent in that office…so much of it doing paperwork that his eyes felt hot and blurry. He wondered if he should call Bauer…compare interrogation notes…let him know what he knew of how that site was being handled…but maybe Bauer already knew. He was a Fed after all. Or maybe he was in the shit as deep as Torelli had been. He’d gotten the impression that Bauer’s superiors were not as pleased with his actions as Torelli’s superiors were with his.

Living within walking distance of the precinct, Torelli turned up the collar of his jacket against the rain that was beginning to fall, but instead of walking north, he walked the other way, hoping the air would clear his head. Obviously the coffee overdose had done little more than make him jittery, so awake now that any attempt to go home and sleep was going to be met with tossing and turning and indigestion if he didn’t get something to eat. His favorite all-night diner was around the block and the lure of a good greasy breakfast after too many hours without food was enough to make him brave the rain.

There were a few other cops in the place when he walked in and shook the rain from his jacket. They nodded at him, and he at them, but no one spoke. Or, if they spoke at all, it was in hushed tones over their coffee as he sat at the far end of the counter out of hearing range. Let them talk. He didn’t care about gossip. He’d done good. If he’d failed at all, it was to connect his partner to that place. He wanted to believe that Simpson was investigating it too, undercover even, but why he would be doing that alone, without his partner, Torelli couldn’t explain. It was even harder to believe, however, that Simpson could have any ties to those people. He was no doctor, no scientist, and though he had done a stint in the Army, he was no government agent. He was just Simpson, a man Torelli had known since being assigned here after the academy.

There was a homeless man cupping his coffee mug in the corner, spending his change on coffee more for the heat of it and the shelter from the weather than because he wanted to drink it. In the back corner booth were four young women Torelli would bet were prostitutes also sheltering from the rain, and in the other corner, nearest the bathroom, too lanky teens huddled together, counting their change, exhibiting all of the usual signs of addicts needing a score and short on funds. No laws were being broken yet, or at least none that would make an off duty cop take action, but he decided to watch the teens in case they got it in their head to rob the diner for enough money to score a hit.

He didn’t need to order; the waitress, past her prime but still pretty in the way his mother was pretty, knew just what he wanted after years of his ordering the same thing every time he came in, day or night. ‘Stuff will kill you’, she often said to his plate of fried goodness, but tonight she just nodded at him with a smile as if to say ‘you deserve this’.

He sure as hell did, he thought with a weary grumble as he dug into his meal and lost himself in the crumpled paper someone had left on the counter and his casual spying on the agitated teens. There was no rush for his seat, no one interested in chasing him out to make room for other guests. He was as welcome here as he was in his own, empty home.

Maybe he needed a cat.

Sometime later, with the rain still falling in the darkness, his phone buzzed against his breast. He scowled and fished it from his jacket pocket with one hand as he turned the page of the newspaper with the other. He opened the text message without looking at the phone. At this hour, he expected it to be his sister. An address. Nothing more. He scowled. He knew that place. The scowl deepened when he saw who the message had come from. What the hell?

He tossed a handful of bills upon the counter, covering the bill and his usual substantial tip, and shoved the phone back into his pocket. On his way to the door, he stopped by the teens’ table, bent low, and growled, “You give Eugenia any trouble…and you’ll wish you’d picked a different diner tonight…”

He did not remain to see what affect his words had upon them. Eugenia kept a shotgun behind the counter. These two gave her any grief, they’d wish for more than not crossing the cops.

*

The rain did not bother Frank. He’d been through worse, lightning storms, desert sand storms, scorching heat, bitter cold. So use to extremes, he almost did not notice as he trekked Hell’s Kitchen’s streets back towards the dingy apartment he called home.

Oddly, he realized as he absently tucked the paper into his coat pocket, it didn’t feel like home to him tonight. In truth, nothing had felt like home since his family had died, or since he remembered them dying that was. There was just a series of apartments, warehouses, basements, grimy back rooms of nondescript, unimportant places where he could work from and occasionally try to sleep.

For some reason the notion of home was pressed to the forefront of his thoughts tonight.

He blamed it on all those clones…men and women trapped in hell whom he had helped free, but to what? They had no homes, no jobs, no money…they had nothing. Most of them didn’t, at least; all except one.

The thought of that one brought with it an involuntary growl which he abruptly pushed aside as stupid.

Well, that guy Hunter had promised to see to the others. It hadn’t been hard to see the man was a soldier too, with some sort of contacts. He’d better do right by those others, or he and Frank were going to have a few words. And maybe not just words.

His desire for those poor souls to find security, find homes, was the only reason he hadn’t lost his head when that other lean fellow had left the CTU office with the redhead.

Damn he needed coffee.

Though he stuck to the shadows, it took him less than two blocks to realize he was being followed. Someone from CTU he imagined. Maybe a cop, but in his experience, cops weren’t this stealthy, not even undercover ones. His efforts to evade his hunter were continuously thwarted, as everywhere he went, his tail was close behind. Suspecting he was more familiar with these streets than his adversary, Frank sought refuge in an empty office building, one set for demolition judging by the signage posted around it and the warnings to the public to keep out. He’d been in and out of this building a few times before, and thus knew the best place to hide, the best place to wait out the stalker to get a good view of them and decide his next move.

No one was that persistent without being a threat. Maybe he just wanted to be sure Frank was leaving. Maybe he wanted to see where Frank would go. Maybe he was waiting for the ideal position for a strike. Whatever he wanted, Frank wasn’t going to give it to him.

A tall man, muscular beneath his dark trousers and hoodie, his movements were barely hampered by the way the wet fabric clung to his skin. He moved like a soldier, which explained his successful tracking and stalking. Frank couldn’t see his face, but he didn’t need to. He was being hunted. There was no way in hell he was going to stand for that. Pistol drawn, he took aim…

And the other man turned and fired, the blast unheard beneath a nearby ambulance’s wail.

It wasn’t a kill shot. Maybe it wasn’t meant to be. The fire of it ripped through Frank’s upper torso, throwing his arm backwards so that he missed his shot, knocking him off balance from his perch in the ceiling beams, causing him to crash to the floor and lose his grip on the gun in his hand. The attacker was right there, and a well-connected kick sent handgun skittering across the dusty floor.

That was when Frank saw his face. That was when Frank knew.

“You!” he spat, rolling into an attempt to stand that was met with a kick to the ribs that knocked him flat again. He did not ask what the cop wanted. He had a reasonably good idea why he was being hunted, even if he did not understand the timing of it. Maybe just an unexpected moment of opportunity.

“Waited a long time for this, Punisher…” He kicked again but wasn’t expecting Frank to hook his arm around his leg and bring him crashing to the ground. The impact knocked his rifle from his grasp, resulting in a scramble for dominance and the reclaiming of any weapon. Hand to hand they were evenly matched; whomever gained firepower first would have an undeniable advantage, an advantage neither was willing to give. “After what you did…”

“What I did?” What the hell was this chit chat? A waste of energy. Their scuffle took them in range of both rifle and pistol. Frank rolled, lip and nose bloody now, mirroring the injuries he’d given his opponent, and came up with the pistol in hand, aimed and fired, just as the butt of the rifle struck his temple and sent him tumbling into blackness.

 

He parked the car near of the empty building and entered through a side entrance. If by some ironic twist of fate he was going to die here, he wanted his abandoned car easily found, his body easily traced to wherever he fell. That was, of course, assuming Simpson didn’t dump him in the river. Half of him couldn’t imagine that sort of animosity from his longtime partner. The other half, after what he had seen in the last twenty-four hours, was open to the possibility that he didn’t know as much about his partner as he’d thought.

The building was silent, save for the faint echo of voices ahead of him. He couldn’t make them out clearly enough to identify them, but there was no mistaking that laugh. His blood chilled and he scowled. Gun raised, he crept forward.

 

“You know I didn’t kill him.” Frank pulled against the electrical cord that bound him to the concrete post, snarling at the other man in the room, wondering what the hell the cop wanted from him. If he planned to arrest him, he’d have done it already. If he intended to kill him, why hadn’t he? There were handcuff’s too, and while he could break free of the cord, given time, losing the cuffs would be more challenging, especially with the pain in his shoulder and the blood loss that was gradually going to sap his strength. It hadn’t yet…but the more he struggled, the faster his body would fail.

“Tell that to the warrant makers,” Simpson laughed. He was fidgeting, taking small quick steps as he paced side to side, no more than five or six steps in either direction and never far enough away from Frank. His hands shook, there was sweat upon his brow, and his pupils were dilated beyond what the dim light of the room called for. The man was an addict, and Frank imagined now that he was to be traded in for the cop’s drug of choice.

He wondered how much his life was worth in pounds of heroin or coke or hash.

“You were there. You saw…”

“What I saw was three bodies…two I know you…” He pulled a small plastic bill bottle from his pocket, emptied the contents into his mouth, and dropped the empty container on the floor.

“Two who don’t appear on the records…”

“No reason to think you didn’t kill the third…”

“He was my friend!” It was probably the first time Frank had admitted that to anyone, even himself. “I would never do something like that to a friend.”

Simpson continued to laugh. “He messed with the wrong people…no way the Yakuza was going to let that go. Surprised they didn’t come after you…you should pick better friends…”

Frank growled. That meant that Simpson, at least, knew Murdock’s identity. That made him angry…and concerned for Matt’s welfare. “Had one…Jasper…before you killed him too…”

“Too? You think I had something to do with the lawyer’s

“What the hell, Will?”

The laugh, which had faltered under Frank’s accusation, ended abruptly as he turned around, the pistol he’d gained from Frank in his gloved hand, aimed now at Torelli’s chest. “I thought you’d decided not to join us, Tommy. Put the gun down…or I’ll shoot you where you stand.”

Torelli had seen that crazed, hazy look in his partner’s eyes before, just as he’d seen that empty bottle at the man’s feet. Sometimes the man’s meds calmed him; other times they wound him up like the timer on a ticking bomb. Simpson already seemed tightly wound, to he hoped that, whatever he had taken, it was either recent enough not to have taken affect…or long enough back that it would kick in and put an end to this craziness soon. Cautiously he squatted and lay the gun on the floor at his feet, hoping he could use reason to get through to him. “With that sort of random cryptic message? You knew I’d come. You also knew I saw you go in there, didn’t you? You knew I was there…?”

Simpson shrugged and waved the pistol directing Torelli to a position opposite of Frank’s after kicking Torelli’s gun away. “Not until after…not until they told me what you and the others did…”

With no need to deny what they’d done, or to explain himself, Torelli asked, “Who’s Jasper…?”

“I don’t…”

“Bullshit,” barked Frank. “You ran over him on his bike and then had the balls to get the whole thing covered over as if it was his fault! He didn’t…”

Blinking, surprised that Frank knew anything about that episode in his past, Simpson said, “You weren’t there…” He’d never bothered to ask the man’s name. To him, the bicyclist had always been ‘the vic’.

“Didn’t have to be. I saw the records…saw the DUI reports…questioned the officers on the scene…”

He couldn’t see Simpson’s face with the man turned away from him, facing Torelli, but Frank could feel the change in the man’s demeanor. He knew guilt when he saw it, even from the back, but the reaction was short-lived.

“Will? You told me the guy cut you off…”

“You know I couldn’t have another DUI on my record…”

“Will…”

“I wasn’t drinking! I swear. There were…people…they made it go away…it needed to go away…” Simpson did not sound apologetic, did not sound like he cared about the life he took. “I need this job, Tommy…and they needed me in there…and now you’ve both cost me everything. You and that damned Devil…”

Torelli took a cautious sidestep, intending to dash around the blonde man for the rifle still lying upon the ground. It was closer than his own gun, and he might just be able to grab it and come up shooting. “I had nothing to do with…”

“You got me suspended…” A wild wave of the handgun coaxed Torelli back into his position. So much for that idea.

“I didn’t even talk to IA…”

“You didn’t back me up! And you stuck your nose in where it didn’t belong…”

“There were hostages! No way I was going to let that…”

“It was none of your business! Those of us on the program rely on Dr. Kozlov…now what are we supposed to do?”

Military bunker. Medical research. Program. Connecting those dots brought Frank to a realization that made his stomach churn. He’d heard about such programs when he had served, there were always rumors of super soldiers, special units controlled by covert factions of the government’s military arm, but such rumors were rarely taken seriously. But if men like Murdock existed, who was to say those rumors didn’t hold some kernel of truth…particularly when he’d seen evidence of experimentation now for himself?

Hell, he’d managed somehow to survive with a bullet in his brain. Who was to say he wasn’t one of those ‘experiments’ too?

Torelli raised his hands in a peace-keeping gesture of surrender. “We can fix this, Will. You’re my partner…I want you back on the job too. Put the gun down and we’ll figure something out…”

“I’ve already figured it out. No going back now, Tommy. Never going to be a going back. They’ll be grateful for getting you out of the way…they’ll get me back on the program…” The click of the catch on the side of the handgun announced the preparation for firing, “and Barnstrum will give me my job back for taking the Punisher down…”

“No one’s taking me down.” Frank had been working the electrical cord against the rough edge of the concrete post he’d been tied to during the entire conversation; Simpson, with his attention on his ex-partner had failed to notice. Now that his hands were free, Frank was able to surge up from the floor, charging head down, to catch Simpson behind the knees and bring him to the floor. The gun in the blonde’s hand went off, the shot clipping Torelli’s bicep and spinning wild into the plastered wall. Torelli dropped and rolled, coming up with the rifle in the process, having it aimed at his partner’s head just as Frank, straddling Simpson’s torso with his hands cupped around Simpson’s face, pulled back as if to bash the man’s head into the concrete floor.

“This is for Jasper…”

“Frank…don’t.”

The words, the echo of Mudock in his head, stayed his action but did not stop Frank from letting Simpson go in such a way that his head cracked once onto the floor, enough to stun him and end his struggle to be free of Frank’s pinning weight. Frank waited long enough to be sure the man wasn’t going to fight and then stood, wincing at the movement of his shoulder.

“You should get that looked at…”

“I’ll deal with it.” Frank didn’t like hospitals. The last time he’d been in one as a patient, people in suits had tried to pull the plug on him. He’d rather deal with the bullet himself. “What about him?”

“I’ll deal with him,” was the mumbled reply.

“He’s a murder…and he would have…”

Torelli growled. “I said I’d deal with him. Whatever those things are…” he scooped up the pill bottle on his way to retrieve his own gun, “…he’s an addict. I’ll get him some help…see that he answers for what he’s done.” How he would answer for his involvement with the secret medical program run from that bunker, when Torelli wasn’t even sure what Simpson’s involvement was, he could not guess. “He’s my partner…he’s my responsibility.”

“He goes after Daredevil…I’ll split him in two…”

The two stared at one another for several moments, Torelli nodding, but honor-bound to protect his partner, and Frank itching to end this here, put it behind him, get justice for the one of the few friends he’d had in a long time, the only person, other than Murdock and Karen, to puncture his emotional shields in any meaningful way. Frank wanted to trust Torelli to do the right thing, but since they could not agree on what the right thing was, Frank had to settle for whatever Torelli could accomplish.

If need be, if any problems arose or Torelli failed to follow through with his promises, Frank would take care of the problem himself.


	15. 15

Daylight came and went, and though this time Matt was awake and aware of the subtle shifts of heat as the sun’s rays traveled across his bare back, he ignored the passage of the hours, the times his phone rang, the growl of his stomach, the dryness in his throat. Instead he remained locked within his meditations as his body healed and his thoughts swirled around the details of his past, his present, his future. He wanted to deny Alvarez’s claims, but the more he considered them, the more he realized that the words made too much sense, explained the lapses and inconsistencies in memory and reality. Alvarez knew about The Hand, the Yakuza, and Havensport…the train…some details Matt hadn’t told anyone…not even Logan. He had heard no deception in the doctor, could think of no reason for him to lie, and it simply made too much damn sense…even if it seemed too absurd and farfetched to be real.

How could there have been two Matt Murdocks?

When he came out of his trance, Matt opted for a pass through the city, looking at the streets, the faces, the lights, with a different eye then he had just nights ago, forgoing the dinner he should have had and the beer he graved, gulping down only a bottle of water before he dressed and sent the Devil into the night. Claire had once said that he might not be what the city needed, but he was the man Hell’s Kitchen had created. But the truth now, however, was that he had been created somewhere else, and although this was the city of his memory, these streets did not match…not really at least. Or rather, the streets were the same, but what lined them didn’t really match. It was like a school dream where the campus was familiar but you couldn’t find your classroom.

And the frustrating, painful part of it was that, he did not feel at home here. Not really. He should feel that way…but he didn’t.

He found the place that should have been his boyhood home, where now stood a drugstore with offices above it. He found what should have been Fogwell’s, only to discover it to be a travel agent’s office surrounded by a parking garage and cluster of restaurants. His grade school was where he thought it should be, but even Elektra’s penthouse was no longer there, now turned into a high-rise of law offices, real estate agents and an electronics store. Buildings of a higher caliber then he recalled, people, as a whole, better off than those who had suffered in the Hell’s Kitchen he remembered. There was still need here…there would always be need…but did they need him? With Oliver here, Diggle…Frank…were they enough?

And in a city the size of New York, what were the odds of another Matt Murdock rising in his place…just as he had risen in the shadow of another?

God his head hurt.

He followed a faint path in his memory to stand in the doorway of a small workshop, the smells of machine oil, metal, heat and sweat heavy in the air. At least this was the way he remembered it, in the right place, the right smells, and finally…

“Jeezus…you scared me half to death…”

“Melvin.” He wondered if the other man could hear the weight of relief in his voice. He probably had no idea how glad Matt was to find him here.

“I haven’t seen you in months…since before Betsy…” Melvin choked, and from the sound of it, he turned away from where Matt stood in the shadows.

“What happened, Melvin? What happened to Betsy?”

“Pneumonia…last winter…”

It was a thank god moment, though Matt didn’t say it. For a moment he’d felt panic, that his ‘death’ had left the woman exposed to enemies from which Matt had failed to protect her…the way he had promised Melvin he would. He could protect people from a lot of thin, but pneumonia and ill health were not among them.

For that matter, he wondered briefly, was Betsy even real?

“I’m sorry to hear that, Melvin. She was a good woman.” Matt had never met her, but if she had cared for a man like Melvin Potter, she had to have been a good woman. “You stayed…”

“He told me to wait here…for you…said you would be back for this…”

Matt recognized the sound of the hard-shelled case plopped down upon the work bench, as he asked, “He? Who?” But he already know.

“Tall fella…scary…always wearing a coat and vest underneath for protection…asked me to make him another but…I promised Betsy after you…that I wouldn’t…”

Frank.

He had said he’d hidden the suit. He may not have expected Matt to come back, not after seeing him killed, but he had the wisdom to hide this where no one else was likely to look and the kindness not to tell Melvin about his death. Where better, Matt mused, snapping open the box to run his fingers over the familiar fabric within, to hide it? His fingers also found the baton, which he took out with a satisfied breath. “Was going to ask about another one of these…”

“Lost yours? I can make another…” Two suits, two weapons. Melvin was happy to help, happy, it seemed, to have someone familiar in his life.

“Thank you, Melvin.” He slipped the baton into the holder upon his thigh and then closed the box. “And thank you for looking after this. But I came to…” He traced the outer edge of the box. “I may have to go away again…maybe for a long time…”

Melvin sighed. “You just got back…I heard you were back but…Doc said I shouldn’t hope for too much…”

“Would you like to come with me?” He was not sure who ‘he’ was this time, who the man’s doctor might be, but he could guess. The same doctor who had told Matt to watch out for Melvin in the first place.

“Come with you?” There was incredulous confusion in his voice. “Where?”

“I don’t know just where yet…but once I get there…if I decide to settle…I can find you a shop…a place of your own…”

“I dunno…I’ve lived here all my life…” Melvin looked around his shop, not trying cover up the distress in his voice. Truth was, with Betsy gone, he had no friends here. He had never been one to make friends easily; people were either afraid of his size and strength or else looked down on him for his disabilities. There were people he did work for, some not so good people, always wanting things from him, but he wouldn’t call any of them friends. Only Betsy, his doctor, and the man before him who had kept Betsy safe and always treated him kindly.

“The doctor asked me to look after you…”

“You know Dr. Alvarez?”

Melvin’s surprise at that was greater than Matt’s, although the acknowledgement that he had guessed the man’s doctor was still high.

“For a while, yes. He had to go out of town…his work took him to treat others…”

“He said he might go to Africa…to help the natives there…but he didn’t know when the job might go through…when he’d get called…said he might not be able to tell me when he was leaving…”

“He asked me to look after you for him…” The lie that was the doctor’s contingency plan, should the dangerous double life he led catch up with him, was adequate for a man like Melvin, who probably would have had difficulty understanding the truth of the situation. “A new town…chance to make new friends…might be good for you…”

Might be good for both of us, he though wryly.

“I dunno…”

“And I’ld be there…to make sure everything’s good…you won’t be alone, Melvin…”

“Just most of the time…” But in truth, since Betsy’s death, Melvin had already been alone most of the time.

Matt could not share his identity with Melvin, as he was not certain it was a secret the man could keep, but he could, at least, look out for him…both as Matthew and as Daredevil. He could introduce Melvin to Logan, to Faith, to Constantine…and they could introduce him to others. Maybe they both wouldn’t have to feel alone then. “It’ll be a good, fresh start, Melvin. Away from the thugs and bad men here. Things will be different…you’ll see.”

“Can I think about it?” He still sounded uncertain, but that was to be expected from a man that Matt suggested did not cope well with change.

“Of course.” Matt was not entirely sure yet if this was the right move for himself; he might get there and decide it was not what he wanted either. He might end up somewhere else entirely, or right back in the middle of Hell’s Kitchen. But until he tried, unless he followed his instincts, he wasn’t going to know.

“How will I let you know…?”

“I’ll send word when I’m set up…and if you decide to come, I’ll pay to move everything…help you find a new doctor…help you meet new friends…”

“You’d do that for me?” That someone, a relative stranger like the secretive Daredevil, would be willing to do so much for him, was overwhelming. “Why don’t you want to stay in Hell’s Kitchen…if you don’t mind me asking…?”

“It’s not the same…doesn’t feel like home anymore. Too much has changed.”

“Yeah,” nodded Melvin. “I know what you mean. Without Betsy it’s just not…right…”

Matt patted the case. “Hold on to this for me, Melvin. I’ll send someone for it, okay?”

“Okay. And I’ll let you know…about the other stuff…I promise…”

But now he spoke to empty air, as the Daredevil was no longer in the shadows. Use to the man’s comings and goings, even if they did sometimes surprise him, Melvin nodded at the empty air then turned his attention to his shop.

Did he really want to consider moving all of this? Was leaving this life in Hell’s Kitchen behind something he was willing to do?

It was going to require a lot of thought…and without Betsy or Doctor Alvarez here to talk it through with, Melvin was afraid he wouldn’t make the right decision.

 

The one person Matt was reluctant to leave behind was the one he sought out next. There was Foggy, Karen, and Claire, of course, but now that Matt knew the truth, that he was not the Matt Murdock those three had known, it explained the odd sense of detachment he felt from them. He considered them friends, loved them in his own way, but they did not feel like the same people Matt had known. Not the Foggy he had gone to school with, not the Karen he had been in business with and had begun to fall in love with, not the same Claire who had patched him up and talked him through some of his darker moments. And whether they would admit it or not, he suspected they felt the same way about him.

It was a peculiar sense of pain to feel that people he should know were basically strangers to him.

For whatever reason, however, Frank did not feel like a stranger. Maybe that was a result of their recently shared adventure, fighting side by side. Maybe if he had spent more time with the others, he would feel closer to them. But Foggy and Karen had moved on from Franklin and Murdock…if indeed their firm had ever, and Karen and Claire now had each other. With the city not the one he knew, Matt simply did not belong here…anymore, he believed, then Frank did.

But the other man’s apartment had been torn asunder, raided of weapons and munitions, table, chairs, bedding all thrown haphazardly about as if someone had been here looking for something…something other than Frank’s abundant stash of hardware. The yellow hazard tape at the end of the hall had been torn and every article of clothing Frank had possessed was likewise missing.

Had Frank done this?

Matt assumed Frank, Jack and the others had been successful in getting away, although it was possible, he thought with a frown as he found the chord to the rigged up light, and traced the line to the break in the wire, that Frank had been arrested as the Punisher and that this disaster was the result of a police raid. Whether he stayed in Hell’s Kitchen or not, he was going to have to be the lawyer here one more time. No way was he going to let the other man be punished for any of this…for anything else either if he could manage it.

The radio was gone too. Even the coffee maker had been knocked from the counter, the glass pot shattered, the chord fractured at the plug so that it would never be used again.

No, Frank had not done this…at least he had done all of this. Maybe he had taken his most important positions and relocated, maybe some part of the neighborhood drug element or some other enemy Frank had made had been here during his absence.

None of those in the bar below that Matt questioned had seen Frank, and his snitch was discovered in the hospital, recovering from a near fatal overdose he’d suffered the last night Matt had seen him.

How was Matt supposed to help Frank if he couldn’t find him?

It was there in the shadows behind the hospital however, where the tech who had given him that last morsel of information left him, that he ran into another familiar face, a man he was relieved to see.

“Visiting?” he asked, inclining his head towards the emergency room door.

“John,” Oliver said quietly, equally surprised to see Matt here.

“He’s okay?”

“After what they went through down there, Ruth insisted he spend the night here under observation. He says he’s fine…but agreed to humor her. He’s being released in the morning; I stopped by to check on him.

“The things we do for those we love…” Matt sighed.

“You?” The forlorn not in Matt’s voice did not go unnoticed.

“Looking for Frank. His place looks like a war zone.”

Oliver nodded. “If it helps…I know they all made it out. John and the others were questioned for hours at CTU headquarters but released. Frank too. Late last night.” As far as he knew, Frank had no cell phone, and he did not know where the Punisher called home. “After that brush with the feds, maybe he chose to relocate.”

“Maybe.” It was a relief to know that the federal agents had not detained Frank, but that did not mean the NYPD had not picked him up later.

“Want me to call Torelli?” He had the man’s number still and planned to make use of it whenever he needed a contact in the police force.

Matt was about to refuse, but then nodded. It would save him the time of going to the station. Midnight drew near, possibly too late now for the one other stop he wanted to make, but there was still much to do before daylight came. Subconsciously, his choice was already made, the execution of the plan already put into action.

There on the rooftop overlooking the hospital’s emergency entrance, with ambulances coming and out of the bays, Oliver made his call while Matt half-listened to the city around them. Now that the hotel hostage crisis was behind him, the city sounded particularly quiet, felt particularly still. Though he was sure crime still bubbled beneath the surface, for now, at least, Hell’s Kitchen was the way he had always believed it should be.

At peace.

“Frank’s okay…not at the station at least,” Oliver finally said. Torelli had sounded rushed, stressed, and had not had the chance to speak in depth, but Oliver believed what he said about Frank. “No one has brought him in, there are no new warrants…”

“Good.” There was a long silence between them, as Oliver put the phone away and waited for whatever it was Matt wanted to say. He could feel it beneath the surface of that silence and wondered if he should prompt him. He had his own plans for the night, including visiting John, but he was willing to wait a little longer…if Matt needed to talk.

This vigilante business wasn’t for everyone, and when it got down to it, who was there for men such as he and Matt to talk to about the insanity of what they saw, what they did?

“I want you to take care of the city for me…”

Oliver scowled. “Going somewhere?” There was no question of Matt hanging up the horns. Men like them didn’t just drop out of this business. This business developed a choke-hold that never let go.

“Maybe…for a while…” He had to at least explore the possibility that Alvarez was correct, explore what the pull to Havensport meant, explore whether his future was there, in Hell’s Kitchen, or somewhere else. “It’s complicated.”

“I get it. Where we belong is rarely easy to find.” He heard Matt’s unspoken confusion and understood it. His own ‘pull’ had brought him to New York, to Ruth and John, but it could have just as easily have lured him somewhere else. Maybe someday it would again. “I’ll watch over them all for you…for as long as you’re gone. And when I see Frank?”

“Tell him…” Matt though about it for a moment, before adding, “Foggy will know how to reach me…unless you want…” He tilted his face towards Oliver, not wanting to presume upon the other man’s generosity or assume that Oliver would want to keep in touch. Here, on this rooftop, they were part of the same world. During the bright hours of the day, they travelled in different circles.

“Yeah…I do.” Whatever the future held for both of them, there might come a day when they needed the other to watch their back. “Hell, one day I might need a damn good lawyer,” Oliver added with a chuckle.

It made Matt chuckle too. “You just might,” he agreed. “I’ll be in touch.” Having bridges like Oliver would make it easier to come back to Hell’s Kitchen, if that was what the future held for him.

*

“What the hell, Matt! You should have returned our calls…we thought you were dead again…”

“He thought you was,” Karen corrected as she embraced Matt tightly. “I knew you’d be okay…as long as you got out of there…”

Matt held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “I’ve returned the calls now, haven’t I?” He would have gotten out of his chair to greet his guests in the mostly empty hotel dining room but Karen’s abrupt display of relieved affection kept him from it. The breakfast buffet was being stocked now, and despite his annoyance with Matt, Foggy was already eyeing the spread.

“You could have called before…”

“I’ve been sleeping…and busy.” Matt drew back as Karen pulled away and he cocked his head to the side. “How are you, Karen?”

“Good…I’m good…I wasn’t hurt, just…scared, you know…” She welcomed Claire’s arm around her shoulders.

Claire smiled reassuringly. “You’re safe now…and the story’s done…”

“Done?”

Snorting, Foggy pulled out chairs for the women and then dropped into the only other empty seat there. “No story here…the federal…”

“They’ve emptied the bunker, Matt…sealed the tunnel…I saw it…” Karen said with the usual breathless excitement that indicated she’d found a bone of a story that she was having a difficult time letting go of. “I had to sign a sworn statement…national security they said…I know all of those people we got out of there were…but what about all the others? What’s being done to them? Where have they been taken? What about Alvarez and Kozlov and…”

“Doctor Alvarez is on sabbatical,” started Claire.

Snorting, Karen turned her coffee cup over for the waitress to fill. “Gone into hiding, you mean.”

“Whatever it is, you signed the agreement. They’re the feds…you don’t mess with national security…”

“Foggy’s right, Karen. You don’t mess with national security…unless you’re willing to face the snake at the end of that rabbit hole. It’s too dangerous…” Matt added.

“We’ve had enough crazy dangerous for one life time. That’s not your job…”

“Someone has to get to the bottom of this…it’s not right what they’re…”

Foggy wagged his finger at her as he got up for food. “You signed the releases. It’s done, Karen.”

Karen pouted. Matt did not have to see the expression to know it was there. If what they had stumbled on in that bunker was as top secret as it seemed, then by now any lead or paper trail or person of interest she could talk to or talk about had been carefully removed from public record, destroyed or hidden, and the people relocated, renamed, and likely threatened with a variety of punishments should they ever reveal what they knew. Karen could dig, but Matt suspected she would find nothing, and her story would come down to uncollaborated hearsay, something she could not publish without looking like a conspiracy nut.

He agreed with her, that those people should be helped, the story should be told. But without proof to back up her story, nothing was going to come of her efforts.

Maybe he could put Oliver on the trail. The man had money, and thus some degree of clout. Maybe he was the in Karen would need. He was definitely the protection she was going to require if she continued to pursue this.

Matt sat alone, toying with his coffee cup, until Foggy returned with a plate of food for him. He was not particularly hungry, his nerves being on kept on edge by the news he had to share, but once the women had returned with their own meals, he dutifully made the effort to eat something, minutes ticking by in the back of his mind, marching towards the point of no turning back.

He was content, calm, and anxious all at the same time.

They did not discuss the details of that abduction and rescue; there were too many people around them and other than hearing more about Karen’s side of the ordeal, there was little for Matt to discuss. He listened to Foggy talk about the firm where he worked, where he was willing to talk open a position for Matt, if he was interested, and they talked about Claire’s work. They talked about when Karen planned to go back to work, again with the cautionary caveat of not risking her life by crossing the wrong people. Matt knew the conversation was rolling around towards him and the inevitable question of what he intended to do now that he had returned to Hell’s Kitchen, and it was with the warnings to Karen in mind from the others, that Matt put down his fork and cleared his throat.

“You have to be careful, Karen…for me…because I may not be here to come to the rescue next time…”

“May not…?” she began with a note of distress.

“What are you talking about, Matt?” challenged Foggy. “Of course you’ll…”

“You know I’m not him…you knew all along…”

Karen covered Foggy’s hand on the table to stay his outburst. “Of course you’re…”

“The Matt Murdock you knew…he died. You saw it…you know…”

Karen scooted her chair sideways and put an arm around Matt. “That doesn’t mean…”

“What it means is that…when you told me…I didn’t know the truth…about who I am…what I am…but I know now. Nothing here is the way I remember it…not even the three of you.”

In moments like this, he was almost grateful he could not see their faces. Feeling their reactions, the changes in breathing, heart rate, body temperature, was awkward enough.

“How this whole…clone…thing…” he winced as he said it, “As I understand it, we get imprinted with certain things…people and places…when we…where are first memories are made. When I was there, all I could think about was being here…now…I need to go back, to see if this is true.”

Foggy scowled. “You’ll always belong here, Matt…Nelson and Murdock…”

“Doesn’t exist…and you know it.”

“So…you’re not coming back…?”

“Hey…” He had expected this to be uncomfortable, but he had not expected Karen to cry. She had been romantically involved with the previous Matt, he knew, but she had, he thought, moved on with Claire. Or maybe he had misread that situation. Maybe there were still feelings there that Karen herself had refused to acknowledge.

But he was not the Matt she had loved, not completely at least, and the thought of trying to fill someone else’s shoes, even that someone had been another version of himself, made him feel strangely uncomfortable.

“I never said that. I know where to find all of you…and you’ll know where to find me as soon as I’ve got a place. This isn’t goodbye…I promise you that.” He turned his face towards Foggy, hoping his best friend would say something. At least they had been best friends. It felt, in this moment, that their relationship hung in the balance, as if neither really knew the other.

They would certainly be safer if he was not here putting their lives at risk, so long as Karen could curb some of her natural inclination towards looking for trouble.

“You’d better. Soon as you’re settled, we’re showing up with strippers and beer,” Foggy said.

Claire laughed, trying to diffuse Karen’s tension just as Foggy was doing. “How about no strippers and beer.”

Foggy grinned. “We can go equal opportunity strippers if you want…so long as there’s beer. Lots and lots of beer.”

“Lots of beer it is,” agreed Matt with a relieved laugh. It would be good to have them see wherever he ended up, for them to know he was not leaving them behind.

And it would be good for him to know they weren’t going to forget him or cut him out of their lives either, just because he might be absent from Hell’s Kitchen.

At least this time he would not be dead.

An hour later he left his friends upon the platform as he boarded the train, this time with three suitcases to his name and a sense of purpose. Unlike the last time he had taken this train, he knew where he was headed, and he knew what he was leaving behind. He had come here to Hell’s Kitchen, and Hell’s Kitchen would always be here for him. Now it felt as if he was going home.

Even though he had no idea what sort of ‘home’ might lay instore at the end of the line.

Matt wasn’t afraid. Going back to Havensport felt like it was the right thing to do.  
~The End...for now~


End file.
